Once Upon A Vindictive Governor

Once Upon A Vindictive Governor

Aliyu Yahya

It is not just by mere coincidence or accident that Governor Ahmed Makarfi of Kaduna state has come into a strong alliance with his now monitor and political godfather, President Olusegun Obasanjo. Apart from some other hidden common handicaps that they might have, there is an attribute that is so glaringly skin deep that the two share. That attribute is the insatiable desire for vengeance on whosoever crosses their path.

Of all the negative attributes that the Nigerian media has associated President Olusegun Obasanjo with, none has laid bare the ‘beast’ in the man than Sam Nda Isaiah’s revelation in the LEADERSHIP weekly newspaper on how the President had, not long ago, stooped so low in his passion for vengeance in order to take revenge on his son, Gbenga, who had crashed his (Obasanjo’s) car.

According to Mr. Isaiah, in retaliation of Gbenga’s action, which took place decades ago, President Obasanjo, whose proud son (Gbenga) had brought a brand new car that he had just bought, for him to see, went on a test-driving trip and deliberately crashed it to an extensively damaging shape. Satisfied with what he did, a smiling Obasanjo was said to have sashayed away from the site of the damaged vehicle, leaving his bewildered son with mouth agape.

The vengeance which President Obasanjo visited on his son, which though came decades after Gbenga’s misdemeanor, could be compared to Governor Makarfi’s final onslaught on his political arch rival, Alhaji Yusuf Hamisu, aka Mairago, the former Executive Secretary, Petroleum Technology Development Fund when he (Makarfi) caused Mairago’s replacement at the PTDF last July. And it could perhaps be rightly said that nothing has exposed the Obasanjo effect on Makarfi more than this bombshell on Mairago. It is not the act in itself that has attracted this assessment, but its manner of execution and timing. I will come back to this later, but for now let’s trace the background to this lingering animosity that has developed between Governor Ahmed Makarfi and the former PTDF boss, Alhaji Yusuf Hamisu over the years.

It should be pointed out from the onset that Yusuf Hamisu, who was not politically relevant in Kaduna state prior to the advent of the current political dispensation, was and is a product and partially a victim of the schism which the 2003 elections has created between President Obasanjo and his vice, Atiku Abubakar.

Mairago and the Kaduna state PDP chairman were the two political arrowheads Atiku recruited prior to the 2003 general elections in order to counter the pro Obasanjo forces spearheaded by Governor Makarfi in Kaduna state. This was meant to achieve two things. One, to reduce Obasanjo’s growing influence in the north and two, to bring back Makarfi on the line (of northern governors loyal to Atiku) or replace him with a more loyal governor. But for the strong propaganda mounted by Makarfi against this move and the unilateral support the PDP elders gave to the incumbent PDP governors in the country, Makarfi’s leadership in Kaduna state would have been by now only history.

Irked by the political conspiracy of the PDP elders, PDP gubernatorial aspirants in the country along with Mairago sued the ruling party, and were as a result, suspended from the party. Mairago later abandoned the legal option, which paved way for a truce in his war with Makarfi, which culminated into a celebrated public reconciliation. The reconciliation was ironically only a photo trick as underground, the animosity continued.

Impressed by his candidate’s performance and in compensation of what he lost at the state level, Atiku in the year 2000 picked up Mairaga and gave him the PTDF job- a slot traditionally reserved for Kaduna state at the Federal level. Mairago’s appointment was last year renewed for another four-year term. But this has not in anyway dimmed Mairago’s ambition of becoming a governor and it did not likewise reduce Makarfi’s opposition to that ambition as Makarfi has become as interested in deciding who succeeds him as he was interested in retaining his position as governor in 2003.

While Mairago was busy consolidating on his political popularity underground in the state, Makarfi was grooming those within his cabinet who would replace him come 2007.

Makarfi might not necessarily have been doing this only to stop Mairogo but to keep inline with the tradition in this country where leaders always ensure that they are succeeded by their stooges after leaving power in order to avoid the inconveniences that might be visited on them by probing and curious successors who might want to dig out and expose the dirts they have left behind.

It was for this reason that Makarfi continued his pursuit of vandetta against Mairago in order to first break him economically and then totally annihilate him politically.

The first offensive, launched early this year, came by way of a probe instituted by the Obasanjo government which acted on allegations against the PTDF Executive Director. But instead of an indictment, Mairago got praises from the probe panel for making the PTDF ‘something the Obasanjo administration could be proud of’. Later, having failed to use his influence to nail Mairago at the Federal level, Makarfi constituted his own probe panel at the state level where Mairago had served as Health commissioner before joining politics. When the panel submitted its report, which obviously indicted the PTDF boss, Mairago went to court and obtained an order restraining the government from releasing a white paper on the report.

Just a week after Mairago’s victory at the court, the PTDF boss was replaced on that position by one of Makarfi’s arch loyalists, commissioner of environment, Husaini Jalo. There were strong reasons to believe that it was the agents of the Kaduna state government and the PDP leadership in the state that handed Mairago both his sack letter and the one that announced his replacement with Hussaini Jalo at the PTDF.

It is so easy to be persuaded to see Mairago’s ouster as a product of the political war that has been going on between Obasanjo and Atiku in which everything that bears semblance to, or smells Atiku is being swept out of government. Critically X-raying the circumstances that led to Mairago’s removal, however, one could see that it’s not much the Obasanjo/Atiku quarrel that has consumed Mairago, as his long running battle with Governor Ahmed Makarfi. This is especially so in view of the renewal earlier, of Mairago’s tenure at the PTDF by the Obasanjo administration. And this development is quiet inline with Makarfi’s uncharitable political profile especially where political opponents are concerned.

Since the commencement of the current political dispensation, Makarfi has employed the powers of his executive position in Kaduna state, and his connection at the Federal level to politically tame or praralyse any one who dare to challenge him at the polls or try his will and authority as governor.

The list of victims of the governor’s vindictive passion is endless. Apart from Mairago, Suleiman Zuntu, Musa Bello, Suleiman Hunkuyi, Yakubu Aliyu, Ibrahim Yaro, Namadi Sani and Samaila Yakawada are other glaring examples.

Alhaji Suleiman Zuntu was the General Manager of Upper Niger River Basin Development Authority, UNRBDA, a federal establishment, from where he took leave in 1999 to contest for the governorship of Kaduna state under the umbrella of the APP (now ANPP). After losing to Ahmed Makarfi, the PDP candidate in the elections, Zuntu went back to the UNRBDA which incidentally is one of the slots reserved for Kaduna state at the federal level. He was later removed inspit of the support he later gave Obasanjo in the Presidential election, when it became obvious in the later years that he was still nursing the ambition of being a governor. Makarfi himself indirectly confirmed this when while speaking on a phone – in radio programme in Kaduna, he remarked that “you know it’s good to wait and see how for someone would go before your tackle him.”

Senator Musa Bello was one of the youngest most ambitious and enterprising businessmen and politicians in Kaduna state prior to the 2003 elections. Mubeco, as he is popularly known, challenged Makarfi in the PDP primaries and also lost out. The series of political misfortunes that trailed his affairs afterwards is now history, but suffice it to say that Mubeco has been economically broken down to a level of obscurity.

Suleiman Hunkuyi, Makarfi’s former commissioner of finance prior to the 2003 elections, abandoned his plum job and decamped from the PDP to opposition ANPP where he picked up the gubernatorial ticket to challenge Makarfi in the elections. In a dramatic turn of events that portrayed his decamping to the ANPP as dubious, Hunkuyi, after losing the elections re-traced his steps back to the PDP in 2004. Although Hunkuyi was promised an appointment at the federal level as a reward for coming back to the fold, he has remained an applicant to date. This is inspite of the opportunity presented by Mairago’s removal as the head of the PTDF.

Samaila Yakawada, another popular politician in Kaduna state, was also one of those that gave Makarfi tough time during the PDP primaries ahead of the 2003 gubernatorial elections. The party prevailed on him to step down for Makarfi. For obliging the party, Yakawada was rewarded with the office of an agriculture commissioner.

Today, Yakawada’s office attracts more political hangers on than those attracted by the other commissioners put together, but its widely believed that a lot of checks are put on him to ensure that he did not use the office as a spring board for ascension to the governorship throne in 2007.

Yakubu Aliyu and Ibrahim Yaro were in a committee Makarfi set up in 2003 to ensure his re-election for a second term. It was this committee, where members were promised attractive political offices if the “mission” succeeds, that catapulted Nenadi Usman to the position of a minister.

Aliyu and yaro were, however never, really rewarded due to a little Misunderstanding they had with Makarfi over campaign funds. Yaro, who was initially appointed special adviser, was later unceremoniously removed from that office.

Although all these other victims share the same fate with Mairago as far as Makarfi’s pursuance of vendetta against them is concerned, Mairago’s short sorjourn at the PTDF has made the difference for him as it has kept him away from Makarfi’s close marking tactics.

As things stand now in the long drawn Makarfi / Mairago war, Mairago’s displacement at the PTDF has set the stage for the real showdown which would inevitably take place in 2007. And Makarfi would soon realize that he has just recruited for himself a formidable opponent who now not only has adequate resources, but also all the time in the world to strategize on how to upset the status quo. One fraction that has not strayed away while Obasanjo’s character was rubbing off on Makarfi is the commando style approach to issues and problems. Though this has, to some extent, served a useful purpose especially by stemming the tide of ethno religious skirmishes in Kaduna state, it has nevertheless led the governor to push his vindictive passions to the extreme. The case in point here is the recent development in Saminaka, the headquarters of Lere Local government, where residents of the hitherto calm town were made to live with incessant raids by hundreds of policemen stationed in the town. It all began in July this year when some agents of the state government went to the Saminaka general hospital to remove a 500 KVA generator, which was donated to the hospital by an international aid agency. When people challenged the attempt by the government agents to remove the generator and when put under pressure, they revealed they were directed to remove it and take it to Makarfi, the governor’s hometown. This provoked youths in the town to take to the streets in protest. A week after the incident, Makarfi visited Saminaka and held a meeting with community leaders where the two parties were said to have reconciled on the issue. Two weeks later, however, about two hundred policemen, acting on the orders of the governor and the Local Government chairman descended on the sleepy town and began to arrest anyone perceived to have a hand in sabotaging the attempt to remove the generator.

Aliyu Yahya is a Kaduna based freelance journalist.