In this interview with SAHARA TV monitored by ENIOLA
AKINKUOTU, the newly appointed Special Adviser to the
President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, who
is also the immediate past Managing Director of The SUN
and President of the Nigeria Guild of Editors, speaks
about his appointment
Are you excited about your appointment?
– Well, it is a call to service and one should be thankful
when called to serve one’s country.
With this appointment will you be switching sides that is,
from scrutinising the government to defending the
government?
– Let me first of all examine what you said, that I will
switch sides from scrutinising to defending the
government. No. The scrutinising part will still be part of
my duty. Before I can speak for the government, I must
first scrutinise the decisions and the policies and then
make an input before I can then defend. So, it is not a
total switch. There must still be a lot of scrutinising
because anything I am going to defend, I have got to be
able to understand it, agree with it and see the rationale
behind it before I can defend it. So, it is not a total
switch.
So, what if you do not agree with a policy? How will you
approach it?
– If I don’t agree with a policy, I will first ask for an
explanation and when I am given the explanation, I will
make my input. But then, my input does not have to
override what may be in the public interest or what is in
the interest of the larger number of people. My opinion
might not necessarily be the correct one. So, when such
challenges come, you have to weigh it and say, is it in
the larger interest of the people, is it in the interest of the
country? Will it eventually result in a better standard of
living for the people? That is the way to look at it. It
doesn’t have to be something I must agree with all the
time. I should be able to appraise the decisions that have
been made and seek to understand them and then make
my contribution as necessary.
There are reports that you know President Muhammadu
Buhari very closely. What is your relationship with him?
– I will say yes. The President is somebody that I have
admired for a long time since he was a military ruler.
When he was a military ruler, I was already in my third
year in the university. So, I can say I knew him and his
style and I liked it. I felt sorry when his government was
overthrown. So, when he came back into partisan politics
in 2003, it was something that was very exciting for me
and since then, I have been supporting him. I am a
journalist and I write a weekly column. I have been
pointing Nigerians in his direction since 2003. And
whenever I wrote anything in his (Buhari’s) support, he
would call me on the phone and we would discuss and he
would thank me. I remember in 2009 or thereabout when
Prof. Tam David-West wrote a book on Buhari and it was
to be presented at the Nigerian Institute of International
Affairs. I was the master of ceremony of the occasion so
we got to speak and know each other better. That was the
first time I would meet him (Buhari) in person. Thereafter,
he ran for President in 2011 and I still wrote in my column
that I thought he was the best person to rule Nigeria and
bring a change. Whenever I wrote those things, he would
call me and he would thank me and we would talk.
So, eventually, in August 2013, I lost my mother and we
needed to do her funeral. So, I sent Buhari an invitation
card. The service was in Lagos and lo and behold, before
the service started, he drove in. It was a pleasant
surprise. It was a Christian service and he sat through it.
Those who had said that he was a religious bigot were
shocked. This was a Muslim man that came for a
Christian service and attended the full service and yet
they were saying he was a religious bigot. So, that act
cemented our relationship because after the event, I
phoned him the next day and thanked him but he said he
was the one that should be grateful because he had never
given me a kobo and yet I always gave him all the
support. He said there were people that could pay me
millions of naira for such support but I had decided to
pitch my tent with somebody that could not give me
anything. So, that cemented our relationship.
You know, in 2011, he said he would not contest the
Presidency again but in the run up to the 2015 election, I
felt he should still run and I wrote that the fact that he
said in 2011 that he would not run again could not be
carved in concrete and he could change his mind if he
wanted and the rest, they say, is history. He changed his
mind, he ran and he won. Significantly, on the night that
he was declared the winner, my phone rang around
midnight and one of our leaders in the media called and
said, ‘Please hold on for Gen. Muhammadu Buhari’. I was
shocked and when he spoke to me, he said he
appreciated my support throughout the campaigns and
now that victory had come his way, he just wanted to say
thank you. So, that was how it played out.
How did you get the appointment? Did he call you or were
you interviewed?
After he had been declared winner and after he had called
me on the telephone, I deliberately stayed away from him
for two reasons. The first was because I knew he would
be under a lot of pressure. A lot of people would be
calling to congratulate him and probably seeking one
thing or the other. So, I think from that night, which was
March 31, I deliberately stayed away from him because I
did not want to add to the pressure that would be on him
and secondly, I didn’t want it to be that I was seeking a
position in his government. I am a born again Christian
and I want anything that happens or comes my way to be
what God has ordained. I don’t push anything; I don’t
lobby for anything so I kept my distance from him. But
then, people around him kept talking to me and kept
telling me that they believed I was the best person to be
the spokesman for the incoming President. However, I did
not give any commitment for two reasons. The first, as I
said earlier, was that I didn’t want to lobby and secondly,
I have a job that I enjoy doing: Managing Director/Editor-
in-Chief of one of the leading newspapers in the country,
The Sun, and then I was also the President of the Nigeria
Guild of Editors. Those are high calibre jobs and
responsibilities. So, I wasn’t looking for a job but then
people around me kept talking to me till eventually, there
was some sort of interview but I would not say it was a
direct interview but people singled me out to say, ‘Well, if
you are invited to serve in government, will you serve?’.
My conviction had always been that I would never serve
in a government except one headed by Muhammadu
Buhari. So, when they singled me out, I told them I didn’t
think I wanted to serve in the government but since it is
Muhammadu Buhari, I will consider it. But I also
reminded them that I also have a job and I have to consult
with my publisher (Orji Uzor Kalu) and I have to seek his
blessings. Reluctantly too, my publisher gave his
blessings. He told me that they would not know the
sacrifice he had made by letting me go but since it is a
service to the country, I have his blessings. So, I got back
to them and told them yes, that I had sought my
publisher’s blessing and the next I heard was the
announcement that I had been appointed Special Adviser
on Media and Publicity.
You will be going into the job in a changing media
landscape. You will grapple with the social media and the
traditional media. How do you hope to navigate these two
worlds?
I would rather refer to the social media as digital media
because the social media is just a variant of the digital
media. Nobody can do anything successfully in the media
today without factoring in the digital media. The social
media, the digital media and every other thing will be
used together. You would have seen the role they played
in the campaigns. You could feel the pulse of the
electorate and could already discern the direction the
election would follow by merely following the digital
media, particularly the social aspect of that digital media.
It played a major role in the campaigns and there is no
way you are going to ignore it. The traditional media has
its place because there are people who are still glued to
it. But the younger generation uses the digital media so
you then need to use all the avenues to reach the people.
So far, what do the media headlines regarding Buhari’s
administration say to you about what you are going to be
dealing with on the job?
I will tell you it is no tea party. It is going to be a hectic
work but then it is going to be me working for somebody
that I believe in. So, I guess I will have to throw my all
into it. I am under no illusion that the job is going to be
easy or a picnic. It will not be. But I will throw my all into
it and as long as my principal remains who he is:
straight, accountable, focused and someone who wants
to effect a change in the country, I guess we will get it
done. When you have a good product, the marketing is
easier.
Have you spoken with previous government spokesmen
like Mr. Reuben Abati and Mr. Segun Adeniyi?
I have spoken with Segun Adeniyi (the late President
Umaru Yar’adua’s spokesman); I have spoken with Ima
Niboro who was former President Goodluck Jonathan’s
first spokesman; but I have not spoken to Reuben Abati.
What advice did they give you?
They gave me an insight into how to do the job
successfully. I have spoken with Segun more than once
but I have spoken with Ima Niboro just once. I will meet
with Segun again and we will talk.