By Muazu Abari
Recently, I wrote an opinion piece titled APC chairmanship: “understanding Adamu political coup against Almakura” published in both print and online platforms aimed at setting the record straight. It was not actually intended to compare the political antecedents, records of achievements between the two contenders from the state, their sacrifices and contributions to the successes of the party because there is actually nothing to compare between darkness and light.
More so that, the forthcoming APC National convention slated for saturday 26th March, 2022 this week which seems to favour the North central and Nasarawa State in particular is a clear choice between those who formed the party, brought it into fruition and ensure its successes and political jobbers who moved into the party after victory was secured for political relevance and survival to reap from where they did not sow.
It is a clear choice between bringing an old, tired and frail politician who has exhausted his political usefulness and supposed to be on retirement bed for long on account of old age and diminishing political fortunes or putting the party in the hand of a vibrant, reliable and trusted political strategist blessed with intellectual capacity, leadership acumen, zeal and magic wand to spring surprises when entrusted with difficult responsibilities.
Interestingly, the piece has generated a lot of interest, comments and reactions especially from citizens of the state with some applauding the write up for its frankness and others especially those emotionally attached to Adamu candidature dismissing the writeup and resorted to name calling but failed to counter any of the issues raised in that piece with any superior arguments the highest reason some of them gave to justify their preference for Adamu is that he has more experience in politics than Almakura.
As weak as this argument sounds, it will not be out of place to put it on record that even if they did not start their politics at the same time but certainly they started their political journey in the same political dispensation and they are both second republic politicians.
While Adamu was the state secretary of the defunct NPN and later chairman in the old Plateau State, Almakura was the state youth leader of the same party and member of the National executive committee of the party and became NRC state secretary in the aborted third republic but nothing was heard politically about Adamu in the third republic.
The issue is not even that of experience or the numbers of public offices you hold but what impact one has made while holding such offices?
Experience does not guaranteed good leadership for instance, Ex- Gov. Doma of blessed memory has more experience in government and politics than Almakura but he turned out to be the worst in terms of performance. The pertinent question to ask is what values have they candidates added to the party? Their records of achievements in office, their political antecedents, their sacrifices and contributions to the successes of the party to warrant their being trusted with the party leadership.
Adamu: Sen. Abdullahi Adamu is an old political fox known for his political treachery, intolerance, dictatorship and insatiable quest for power at all cost and by all means even against collective interest who see politics as a life time career rather than a call to serve. He has no forgiveness and accomodation in his political dictionary and he can go to any length including throwing decency away in dustbin to remain politically relevant.
He was brought in as governor in 1999 by so many political juggernauts such as Sen. Haruna Abubakar, Dr. Dalhatu Araf of blessed memories, Sen. Solomon Ewuga who was believed to have even won the primary but was pacified as his running mate but these people became his first set of political casualities.Within his 8 years in office, he made a giant strides in the education sector by allocating 27 percent of state budget to the sector leading to establishment of 4 tertiary institutions.
These institutions are Nasarawa State university Keffi, Nasarawa State polytechnic Lafia, School of health technology keffi and school of Nursing Lafia but unfortunately these schools were not build on any brand new structures; instead, some old existing schools were discarded to give way to these new institutions and without value addition in their infrastructures and facilities making them more of glorified secondary schools .
The famous SPS Keffi become state university, Nasarawa polytechnic Lafia took over infrastructures and facilities of Government college Lafia and school of health technology Keffi dislodged GSS Antau even though, he gave automatic employment to the first set of indigenous graduates of the university as a moral booster to curtail the alarming rate at which Nasarawa state students continued to neglect the university in favour of other universities in the country.
His administration also inherited 4 General hospitals from Plateau State and he decided to expand on this by converting some existing old structures into General hospitals in those local governments that were created along side the state and few roads. His efforts to establish some cottage industries turned out to be dead on arrival and a conduit pipe where huge resources of the state were wasted except for Farin Ruwa independent power project which was a mere window dressing abandoned even by his successor who he brought to power untill Almakura emerged and decided to build upon it .
If you take away his efforts in the education sector he has virtually nothing on ground to showcase as achievements even Lafia the state capital under his watch was more of a glorified local government instead he ruled the state with highhandness and dictatorial tendencies according to his whims and caprices where the lean resources of the state which should have been used for development find itself into private pockets and used to empower political cronies and expanded on frivolities and purchase of traditional tittles across the country which further indebted the state and retarded its development.
Almakura: Sen. Umaru Tanko Almakura is not a political opportunist who worship any government in power for political and economic survival but a successful business man, progressive minded politician and committed democrat who rose through sheer dint of hard-work, dedication and resilience to achieve a political greatness after many years of accomplishments in the business world and property development market.
He was known for his humane disposition, politics of ideas and development, simplicity, humility, honesty, prudent management of resources, popularity, love for the common man and ability to put detractors to shame with performance these antecedents continued to speak for him in his political life even before he became Nasarawa Governor. He abhors vindictiveness and desperation in his politics and never see politics as an end but a means to an end.
The story of how he emerged as Nasarawa governor in 2011 through sheer political doggedness, popularity and acceptability among the ordinary people of Nasarawa state despite elitist conspiracy, incumbency factor and federal might to bring President muhammadu Buhari former party CPC to power which put a death knell on PDP in the state a political master stroke that qualified CPC to go into merger with other opposition parties which gave birth to APC and bring Buhari to power speaks volumes on his pedigree and political acumen which will remained a reference point in Nigerian politics.
A product of popular movement who came fully prepared on his individual merit armed with visionary ideas to re-write the development history of the state despite so many obstacles ranging from frightening debt profile, financial strangulation, decayed infrastructures, partisan lawmakers who are more concerned with politics rather than development but he never allowed all these to distract him but swung into action immediately to implement his vision and dreams for the people of the state and since then Nasarawa never remained the same again in terms of development there is virtually no dull moment from the beginning to the end of his administration.
Within the 8 years he served as governor he has not only succeeded to rewrite the development history of Nasarawa state but also raised the bar of governance and turned the state into a model of good governance and infrastructural development in Nigeria which will be very difficult if not impossible to replicate let alone surpass leaving behind a big shoe in the politics and governance of the state with his legacies and footprints scattered across all sectors of the state which will forever speak for him in his politics and future ambitions.
Education: The education sector of the state was in coma prior to his emergence with the gates of all tertiary institutions in the state under locks and keys due to industrial action but within just few weeks in office he was able to resolved all the issues and got all the schools re-opened for academic activities, paid 18,900 as the new minimum wage in the state above federal government approved rate and also invested massively in the sector which led to establishment, renovations and rehabilitations of schools across the state.
For the first time in the history of Nasarawa storey buildings with world class equipments and facilities were build as primary schools known as Taal model schools in all the 13 local governments in addition to a brand new and world standard special schools for disabled such as the blind,the lepers and other categories of physically challenged people were build in lafia,Akwanga and keffi representing the 3 senetirial districts of the state.students schoolarshipd and school feeding programmes were not only revived but education from primary to post primary were made free of charged as well as brand new school of Nursing and midwivery was build and relocated.
Nasarawa under Almakura also witnessed massive recruitments of teachers, distribution of instructional materials, equipments and facilities. general rehabilitation and additional constructions in public schools across the state even the state owned tertiary institution were not left out as they also benefited from road networks and brand new 250 bed capacity hostels in all the institutions namely Nasarawa university keffi,Nasarawa state polytechnic lafia,college of Agriculture lafia,college of education Akwanga including federal university lafia.
Lafia the state capital which was completely neglected by Adamu and his successor and was looking more of a glorified local government was transformed to an attractive state capital befitting of its status with massive investments in infrastructures,roads constructions ,traffic and street lights at designated points within the state capital to ease vehicular and human movements among other urban renewal efforts which also boost the economic activities of the state .
Another proud legacy of Almakura administration which distinguished him with all the previous administrations that ruled Nasarawa since its creation is in the area of massive road constructions.Almakura who inherited a state without a single asphalt road apart from the federal road which passed through lafia to makurdi have carried massive constructuons of urban and rural roads across the length and breadth of the state with dual carriage ways and street lights in various parts of the state linking various communities never experienced in the history of Nasarawa development.
The health sector of the state also recorded tremendous boost under Almakuras administration apart from upsetting the backlog of salary arrears of health workers and implementation of the new salary structure he has also introduced free medical services to pregnant women and children under 5 years ,drugs revolving loans,in addition to constructions and up gradings of General hospitals, primary health care centres, recruitments of healthworkers as well as constructions of models hospitals in Lafia, Akwanga and Nasarawa among other efforts.
The people of Nasarawa state have also witnessed tremendous improvement in electricity and water supply to most parts of the state where the administration succeeded to purchase,ndistributed and installed high voltage transformers and electricity equipments and collaborated with reputable private power companies which improved power supply to most parts of the state and succeeded to restored water supply to some parts of the state and carried rehabilitations of water projects in Lafia, Mada station, Nasarawa Eggon, Akwanga, Doma, keana and Nasarawa among others.
The abandoned Farin Ruwa independent power project which was a ghost of itself since its establishment by Adamu administration received priority attention of Almakuras government who committed huge resources to bring the project into reality this attracted the federal government to sign an agreement with the state government and take over the project for the benefits of the state and Nigerians. To further boost the economy of the state Almakura also embarked on massive constructions of modern markets with the state of art facilities across the 3 senatorial districts.
Karu international market was taken over re-designed, expanded, completed and commissioned. Other achievements of the administration can be seen in the areas of digital land administration, rejuvenation of the transport sector, construction of gigantic modern fire service outlets across the 3 senatorial districts, central medical stores, 500 capacity Lafia city square, Lafia international cargo airport just to mention but few.
Abari, a journalist, writes from Yola.
