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The Squandering Of Goodwill In Kano By Saka Raji Audu
One is not surprised about the article written by one Abba Mahmood in the Leadership newspaper of the Thursday column dated 18th September 2008 under the above heading. This is chiefly because contemporary nature of our society regrettably permeates unwholesome attitudes where son can simply stand up and slap his father with impunity, all in the name of freedom of expression. A society where to do well becomes a taboo. It is a society where rogues are hailed to the detriment of honest men. It is a society where fiction is more relevant than the reality and a society where responsible journalism has been thrown to the dogs.
Reading the squandering of goodwill in Kano by Abba Mahmood, it once again reminds me of the ugly politics of our society, where no matter the efforts of a leader to enhance the general standards of living of the people, such leader is usually subjected to condemnation simply because some pockets of alms chair critics in an isolated world want to make others believe willy nilly that the best way to be radical was to choose the option of casting stones and aspersions. Fortunately enough, the late Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto (of blessed memory) reminded us before his death that whoever destroys to succeed would see destruction awaiting the door step of his success. During the life time of our Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), he never went on offensive battle. Most of the battles he fought like badr, uhud, trench, khandaq, etc are defensive battles. Asides whatever one would like to say, Muslims are never known to ferment trouble except where some one from somewhere else decides to provoke. In this case, the issue of defence comes to play. These are what form the bases of this response.
Truth heals and rebuilds, dear Abba Mahmood. He may not know that conscience as an open wound, only truth can heal it. So, his corollary of accusations on Malam Shekarau administration, deliberate as it may look like is baseless, malicious and unfounded. Such provocative and malicious allegation as we have in his squandering of goodwill in Kano is imaginary and could only be peddled by him because he has no grasp of the situation and perhaps, he does so to curry favour and sympathy from the idle oppositions since it is very easy to destroy than to build. But the genuine people that went into the scorch sun of 14thApril 2007 to vote and stand behind Malam Shekarau's second coming would not shy away from putting the record straight no matter the name calling, knowing full well that the bad people thrive in our society because the good ones refuse to act.
It is against this premise that the many falsehood contained in Abba Mahmood's last Thursday's column in the Leadership paper to rubbish the goodwill of Shekarau and his administration will be corrected. For the fact that no governor has ever had a second term except the current one, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau shows the uniqueness of the governor in the first place. Why was it that in spite of the good performances of the first elected governor of old Kano, now Kano and Jigawa, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, he could not secure second term just because he defected to another party and instead a less educated man was put in place? Did it mean that if Rimi had provided every nook and cranny of the Kano with water and other infrastructures, the Kano politics would still have rejected him just as Abba Mahmood decides to condemn Shekarau in spite of the governor's glaring landmark achievements? This is why Abba Mahmood should have understood the dynamics of Kano politics better than he portrays it. He should therefore understand that factor that gives rise to leadership in Kano is not just based on how many drums of water, how many roads, school desks, chairs and how many infrastructures provided but that once the people of Kano have decided on any thing, they stand by it. This is the bitter truth of the matter.
It is often said that there is no smoke without fire. Therefore, there are two main reasons from the contextual discourse of Abba Mahmood's squandering of goodwill in Kano why he decides to bash Malam Shekarau in particular and his administration in general. First, Abba is simply surprised or not happy that the amiable and peace loving governor broke the much talked about the Kano political jinx through his second term election as governor of the state. This is in spite of the previous administrations efforts to taste same feat with no avail. The second theme is that of car gifts offered to royal fathers, ulamas and senators. These are the two basic reasons that instigated the latent anger of uncle Abba in his Thursday back page column to the extent that he had to fabricate, castigate and rain insults on an honest and gentle Malam and his government.
Borrowing from the script
of the opposition party, our uncle Abba lamented that Kano got about
The questions Abba Mahmood may wish to answer are these. Who he rehabilitated Obasanjo road in Kano? What about Lamido road in Tarauni LG, Hausa/Ibo road, Beirut road, Bello Kano Terrace, Audu Bako secretariat, the Yola Kwanar Goda, the Kofar Mazugal/Yan mota, Dakata Yankaba, Tukun tawa roads, Kofa Fomfu, ATC junction road, zoo road, Festing/Burma road, Zaria road by Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital round about, Goron Dutse/Jakara road, Challawa Industrial Estate road that was overlooked by past administrations to mention but few? Are all these roads not in the state capital? It may also interest Abba Mahmood and his fellow travelers in Kano that work is presently going on the rehabilitation of the State road and Abdullahi Wase road, which are all in the state capital.
Abba also talked of inadequate water in the state. In fact, one does not know what constitute Abba's inadequate water. Since Audu Bako era, down to last administration before the present one, which period had Kano ever got adequate water? It is only Malam administration that injected additional volume of 150 million litres of waster into the existing one. And for the so called adequate water to be realized in Kano and any other state of Nigeria for that matter, we cannot ignore the issue of power supply, which we know pretty well, is also a big problem in Nigeria. Against this background, Shekarau administration is making frantic efforts to establish Independent Power Plant (IPP), contract of which has already been awarded. The governor also injected a lot of money in the provision of infrastructures to the state primary schools along with the welfares of their teachers. This is in addition to the services provided by some independent financial institutions in the maintenance of primary and secondary schools under the government's corporate social responsibility (CSR), which has never been the case in the state. Abba would have done well if he had mentioned few schools in which there are no desks or chairs to enable the government act promptly, instead of choosing the option of pull him down (PHD) syndrome that has never helped in the progress and development of any society.
Shekarau also paid his due in the issue of industrial problems of the state. Smuggling in particular constitutes headache of the textile companies in Nigeria. The Chinese through the Nigerian local collaborators are daily flooding our markets with their textile goods without any counter resistance by the Nigerian authority. It is very sad to observe that the kiths and kin of the same authority charged with the responsibility of fighting the menace called smuggling are themselves guilty of the offence. It is no longer difficult to mention the personalities aiding and abetting smuggling into the country. Perhaps, I should think that the government is very much aware of this, yet it could not do any thing to check the practice. One can vividly remember that the government of Kano under the present dispensation had cooperated with the Custom to fight the smuggling through seizure of the contraband materials. Unfortunately, the powerful Chief of Smugglers who is always being empowered could not allow the Kano State war against smuggling to succeed. Political differences were later used to nail the war in its coffin. The Kano administration had to fall back on infrastructure maintenance such as roads leading to the industrial nerve centre of the state. The issue of multiple taxations is also being solved by the state government. But the federal Government, it seems, is yet to do its part of the bargain. It is the flip-flap fiscal policy of the federal government that is making new investment difficult in Kano and discouraging the old ones not to continue.
I quite agree with Abba Mahmood that Kano has the highest number of beggars and destitute. This is why in the entertainment parlance; KANO is jokingly referred to as Kuturu Almajirai Never Obey. This is also why Malam Shekarau had cause to introduce Tsangaya project to tackle the problem of beggars in the state. By the way, where are the parents/guardians of these beggars, many of which come from neigbouring states as Katsina, Yobe, Borno, Jigawa, Kaduna and even the federal capital territory, FCT to impregnate the beggars' population in the state? If the parents/guardians of the beggars had not shied away from their parental social responsibilities on these neglected citizens, the problem now talked about would have been reduced to the bearable minimum. But, see where we are today. No body wants to address the issue of parental negligence but to put the problem squarely on the head of Shekarau simply because he has offered himself to serve the people. I should think that parents should have endeavoured to complement the effort of government by trying to live up to their parental responsibilities to secure the future of their kiths and kin.
It is not just possible for Malam Shekarau to neglect his religious obligations just because of pockets of problems some people would like him to know. Whatever Shekarau does, the ultimate is in the hereafter. Every one must try to prepare for that abode. This is why Shekarau prefers to spend his yearly vacation in Saudi Arabia to offer prayers to God in solitary mind. Again, no leader can achieve success in isolation. His visits to foreign countries are part of resolving some of the state naughty problems as we can see from his trips to Malaysia and other places. The period Shekarau is not around, his deputy is around to take care of the state affairs since he is capable of doing so. Therefore, no one should have seen the governor's absence otherwise except for the purpose of noise making.
Yes, Lagos state government might be receiving fewer resources than Kano. This does not mean that same method can be utilized by both in resolving their issues. Abba Mahmood should not forget in hurry that the level of education, environment, and society are not the same. For example, as early as 1859 when the Church Missionary Society opened a Grammar School in Lagos, the equivalent of such a school to be opened in the North was the opening of a government school in Kano in 1912. How can one now come out of blues to compare Lagos with Kano, knowing full well the criminal gap that had existed between the two states? It is an unfair comparison. This not withstanding, the level of crimes in Lagos is far more than that of Kano. This is why; some investors and business men prefer doing business in Kano to Lagos because of the security situation, which is very important. Against Abba Mahmood's wish, let him have rest of mind that by the grace of God, the car gifts offered to the monarchs will never attract robbers in the state because there were more such cars before the monarchs' own and nothing happened. Kano is under the control of God and He is always of great assistance and protection to the state.
If I were Abba Mahmoud, I
would desist from all sorts of unsubstantiated speculations. I would have
mentioned the local government Chairman that got
Finally, as Muslim, I am surprise that Abba Mahmoud had to worry about the persecution and humiliation of Shekarau by Kwankwaso as expressed in paragraph five of his squandering of goodwill in Kano. Has he forgotten the life history of our beloved Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) in Mecca before migrating to Yatrib now Medina? Has he forgotten one of the Prophet sayings that "this world is like a prison yard for the righteous? In Nigeria, nobody condemns bad leaders except the good ones and so, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau of Kano State should not be an exception. Allahu Akbar! For the sake of this holy month of Ramadan, may the Almighty God deliver us from treachery, conspiracy, backbiting and sensational report of our modern journalists at all levels, Amin.
Saka Raji Audu writes from Kano and can be reached on his e-mail: sakaraj@yahoo.com |