In Sokoto, It was Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish

By

Dahiru Maishanu

 

 

April 14th, 2007 confirmed my inner-most conviction that the heap of advertorials and publicity claiming Governor Attahiru Bafarawa to be the man to beat in Sokoto has always been a clot of ruse. I’d arrived Sokoto Wednesday, April 11th, fully determined to be on the ground to monitor the elections at the grassroots, in my Torankawa Village of Yabo local Government area of the state. The elections would provide me an opportunity to see the strength of the governor and his party, the DPP at the grassroots vis-ŕ-vis the other contending parties.

 

As early as 6am, I was on the road to Torankawa Village, where I hoped to spend the whole day until votes are cast, counted and announced by the local polling officers. I went with, a zeal second to none, and an unquantifiable conviction that with my physical presence, I will not have any reason to doubt the outcome of the elections, at least in my locality.

 

My earlier observation in the state showed me that the DPP as a party was heading towards disgrace and eventual extinction from the hands of the electorates. In the months preceding the elections, the chants of Sai Alu from all segments of the society would easily give the elections to Alhaji Aliyu Magatakada Wamakko, no matter which platform he runs on. There was a certain revolutionary wind blowing palpably in the air that was about to consume those who considered themselves as infallible.

 

I had no doubt in my mind that Dr. Wamakko was on his way to cruising to victory. I knew the media hype for Bafarawa and Katuka, his anointed successor, was rented and stage managed as well. I knew all along, the so-called ‘columnists’ and writers singing the praise of the governor were a horde of rented, hungry journalists who had been feeding fat on the governor and by implication, on the meager resources of the state. In return, they confused and misinformed the public on the popularity of the governor. I also knew that if elections were going to be free and fair, the man can be beaten by anybody in Sokoto, hands down.

 

Here we are at the polling station where there are no state officials to intimidate the ordinary voter. No newspaper columnists and the so-called commentators to confuse and spread a false achievement portfolio of the g government to confuse the hapless voter and cajole him to vote the governor’s chosen successor. No Rima Radio to anchor endless propaganda rendezvous in praise of the governor.

 

Today is the day of decision. Today, the ordinary Sokoto State citizen will decide who will rule him and who will not. The hour of truth has beckoned. As the sun starts setting, the results of seven out of eight polling stations in the area were announced by the collation officer with the opposition carrying the day. The day of reckoning has truly arrived.

 

Prior to April 14th, we had constantly been bombarded by the state information agencies, notably the State Radio and the Television stations and some elites parading themselves as writers with bogus achievements purportedly recorded by the government. These people constantly kept pouring us with the rhetoric that the governor was the best thing that ever happened to the state. They carried their blackmail even to the future by assuring who ever cared to listen that the governor would continue to be the determining factor of who becomes who in the state at least, for the next two decades. No wonder, the Governor and his cohorts had been going about claiming victory even before the elections were held.

 

Governor Bafarawa, through a stoic arrogance had for a very long time squandered any good will he had ever amassed as a leader in Sokoto. The governor had been hopping from one crisis to another. He quarreled with the national leadership of his former party the ANPP, quarreled with the elites in the state and even trampled on the traditional and religious institutions including the highly revered Sultanate.

 

He also openly allowed himself to be entangled into a sectarian religious crisis where some prominent members of his government were seen as overtly complicit. Despite all these, I wonder what continued to give the governor the impression that the people whose socio-cultural as well as religious institutions he has so callously tried to decimate would still be behind him to the extent of overwhelmingly voting for his political party at the polls.

 

Bafarawa carries the badge of the ultimate power-drunk and arrogance personified. How could a governor swear in public that the opposition will not get even a councillorship seat in the elections? How could he swear in public that he knew who he would hand over to and who he would not? How could he play God?

Unfortunately, the time has come for the governor to eat his words and hand over to the same person he swore in public not to hand over to. Now is the time when the governor will learn to respect the will of the people. From now on, he will realize that the sweet words of praise singers and bootlickers were after all, fabricated just to amuse him.

 

He will know that all those accolades poured on the pages of newspapers by those pay-as-you-go writers in his praise were written with an ulterior motive of only feeding fat on him. Section 308 of the constitution will not be there for him as from May, 29th, 2007. The underbelly of the fowl will be exposed from that day. From that day, the guilty will be made to dance naked in the market square.

All the claims of ‘monumental’ achievements amplified by those ‘trumpeters’ will have to be verified and probed. On the claim that the governor is leaving 13 billion naira in the treasury of the state, this is the time he would either be forthcoming or he will again to be forced to eat his words. The governor will also have to explain the iron rod scandal that has been rocking his administration for a long time.

 

The governor will undoubtedly have to defend his government on the accusations once labeled against it, by the group of 23 and the Sokoto Vanguard. How the so called SSG2 account was created and operated will have to be explained against the background of accusations that between 200 and 400 million naira have been siphoned via that account on a monthly basis since 2004. Incidentally, the defeated flag bearer of the DPP and former Secretary to the Government, Alhaji Maigari Dingyadi was alleged to be the sole signatory to that account.

 

The can of worms likely to be opened will also include the divide and rule tactic religiously followed by the Governor and his cohorts, especially the State Chairman of the DPP, Alhaji Umaru Kwabo who has since become a regular customer to Nuhu Ribadu’s EFCC. The string of palace-like buildings at the former Polo Club allegedly belonging to Kwabo will have to be explained. So also, the state will ask how contracts were handled especially in road construction where hundreds of millions of naira were allegedly siphoned through inflation of contracts.

 

The revolution that swept Bafarawa is a good omen not only to the people of Sokoto State, but to all Nigerians. It marks the end of arrogance and pomposity. It is also a lesson for Bafarawa himself as he will now know that all those eulogizing his name were only there for the crumbs of power. Now that power is about to elude him, he will soon find that power was the only ingredient that differentiated him from other people. The people he had stepped upon while on the top are the ones to be calling the shots as from May 29th.

 

Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko who he tried hard to humiliate and disgrace has come out victorious and triumphant. The same people of Sokoto who picked him from no where in 1999, have returned him to where they picked him. Those who gave him the title of professor of politics will spite at him and call him by his real name. They would remind him of his ‘pivotal’ education and tell him to forget the professorial chair.

 

Who says the cookie was not crumbling in Sokoto? We have been vindicated as the cookie has finally crumbled. Bye-bye to arrogance, bye-bye to Semi-illiterates in power, bye-bye to iron rod politics and God bless the people of Sokoto State. Good riddance to bad rubbish.