Northern elders find governors guilty of poor governance
From Saxone Akhaine, Kaduna
KADUNA State Governor Alhaji Ahmed Muhammed Makarfi was caught unawares by the haranguing. And even when he rallied to put up a stout defence for his colleagues, it was obvious that his defence did not match the scolding.
First Republic Minister of Finance, and elder statesman, Malam Yahaya Gusau was blunt and unsparing.
He told the 19 Northern State Governors that the North was better in the days of the late Sir Ahmadu Bello and Alhaji Tafawa Balewa. Today in the North, good governance has been thrown overboard to the dogs.
While former head of states, Gen. Yakubu Gowon and the presidential candidate of the All Nigerian Peoples Party (ANPP) Maj.-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari watched, Gusau harangued the governors. He said that talking about northern failures is always seen as the cause of the problems, because "those that talk are considered to have sinister motives, and are nuisance.
Last week's meeting of the 19 governors of northern states, elders in the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) and other stakeholders, in Kaduna raised two major things. First, it brought to focus the concern of the leaders to the state of development in the north. Secondly, it harped, perhaps more than ever before on the issue of unity for the region.
At the end of the meeting, the stakeholders resolved to tackle the issues of mistrust and unity. Also on the front burner was the ethno-religious crisis, which has become a perennial problem for the North. This they noted has also served as a bane to economic and political growth of the area.
A day before the start of the summit, the ACF elders inducted members of the Board of Trustees (BOT) and National Executive Council, (NEC). It turned out to be an occasion for more than a heart to heart talk with the governors. The northern elders flayed the 19 governors for failing the people and not living up to their responsibilities of governance. It was impressed on the governors that their failures could be seen in the economic, social and political development of the people and the north as an entity.
Said Gusau: "Talking loudly may be provoking negative responses from some powerful people. In any event, it is while we have been talking that our situation has been deteriorating, moving from bad to worse."
He said: "No one can deny and I certainly do not wish to play down the seriousness of the circumstances in which we now find ourselves. When people say that Nigeria is not working and not meeting the simplest aspirations of a majority of its citizens, they are not being mischievous. They are only stating a fact to which we all bear witness."
Gusau pointed out that, "to continue to describe these cruel state of affairs in Nigeria today, which we all know, is to inflict more pain. And yet we cannot stop. Because until we discover and work on the means to eliminate or reduce them, the pains will sooner consume us. A lot of work is needed. Nigerians and Northerners in particular must liberate themselves from the inaction and pious hopes for a better future. Not much come from were talk."
He posed some questions: "Why is there so much misery, poverty and violence in a country with so bountiful resources? What has been preventing us from mastering the will to take on and tear down the yoke that is holding us captives?"
The octogenarian however put the blames everywhere. He said: "To be sure, governments - federal, state and local - bear a major responsibility for our failures as a people and they have a duty to lead in its resolution.
"Yet, it is a mistake to spend so much effort bemoaning the failures of the centre while comparatively little concern is being shown for the even more disastrous failures at the state and local council levels. At also at the level of our various public and private institutions, and more particularly at the level of individual members of our communities.
"We cannot proceed as if people have no responsibility for anything. We must be aware that we have a duty to extricate ourselves, our families and our communities from the yoke of ignorance and poverty."
Citing past instances, he remarked that "time was, when here in the North, when local councils from their own resources bore the cost of providing nearly all social services in addition to capital development and maintenance of infrastructure on regular, not ad hoc basis."
The situation he said has degenerated. "It would seem that the funds being channelled into local council are spent almost entirely on administration and the welfare of officials. Nothing is left for real work, and our local councils have busied themselves persuading us as to why they should bear no responsibility for anything - primary education, primary health care, even basic environmental sanitation and hygiene."
The First Republic politician cautioned both the state and local council leaderships to show enough decency in the use of public resources and channel them into development projects, which will benefit the people, rather them stack then in private accounts.
In his effort to defend the present crop of leaders, Makarfi tried to go beyond looking for scapegoats and excuses. He said that he agreed that there was need for the governments at all levels to live up to the expectation of the people in the development of the North, and the country in general.
He however stated that certain fundamental inhibitions are confronting those in leadership positions, who have the genuine aim of contributing to the development of their various areas.
He bemoaned the problems of population explosion and some illiterate council chairmen who were elected into offices and cannot be trusted with public funds. The tragedy is that some of them do not understand what is meant by development. He noted that the concept of development at the grassroots is the major issue, which should be addressed. He used a personal experience to illustrate the situation.
"I was at home one day, and a man came to me. He complained about certain things. I asked him how many children he has, and he said about 30. And I also asked him if he knew all of them by name. He said no, that he sees them before he can recognise them.
"How do you expect government to provide enough social services and amenities under the pressure put by the population on the limited resources until we have to sit down and discuss this issue. Until we find how to address it, we may not go anywhere."
The governor also said that the activities of some local council chairmen in resource management should be addressed.
He said: "Many council bosses have displayed an inability to prepare sound budgets that will benefit the people in their areas. Our experiences have shown that if you ask a local council chief to make out a simple budget estimate, he will be unable to make it.
"So, how do we think that somebody who cannot make a simple budget estimate, can implement government programmes. These are things that should be taken into account. If you give a lot more responsibilities, then how are the responsibilities going to be executed?
"These are issues that if we are sincere, we could sit down and think of ways of addressing. Otherwise, the issue of waste of resources will continue unabated. And the problem will continue unabated and continue to multiply. and when the bubble will burst, I do not know who is going to be set free from the splashes of the bubbles."
The Northern governors believe that the underdevelopment of the north goes beyond the issue of putting resources together to fund the growth of the region.
They also located greater problem in the area of the incessant crisis and tension in the North, which has resulted in the destruction of lives and properties, and has scared away potential investors from the area.
In the search for answers to the issues of development in the region, experts were invited to proffer discuss the issues of violence and ethno-religious crisis.
Among the experts from the region are Nassarawa State Governor, Alhaji Abdullahi Adamu, Makarfi, Rev. Fr Mathew Hassan Kukah, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), the Jama'atu Nasril Islam (JNI) and some dons.
Chairman of the Governors' Forum, Jigawa State Governor Ibrahim Saminu Turaki explained the reason behind the peace conference. He said, "as leaders on whose shoulders lay the responsibility for the progress of our people, we are deeply disturbed by the spate of incessant conflicts."
He saw it as the responsibility of any leader to protect life and property and that without peace, the ultimate goal of social and economic development will be impossible to achieve. The governor stressed that the relative "peace we enjoy today against the background of breakdown of law and order experienced in the recent past can be attributed to the mechanisms we have so far put in place."
He insinuated that some politicians were the brains behind the crisis in the North in an effort to realise their political ambitions. He said: "there are detractors who believe that peace in the North, and by extension peace in Nigeria is an obstacle to their narrow political and economic ambitions. They have deliberately fanned the embers of mistrust and hatred aimed at tearing us apart along ethnic, religious and geo-political lines.
"It is amazing that some people believe that their own political relevance depends on our disunity. We are fully aware of this plot and we are determined to nip it in the bud in the interest of our people."
The divisive tendencies within the North as Turaki pointed out, also needed to be checked. He harped on the divisive issue of settlers and indigenes and said that: "in our northern family, there can be no settlers and indigenes nor can there be a majority and minority ethnic group." Adamu had made the same point when he spoke on the struggle by the people of Middle Belt for self-identity.
Adamu said: "Never in the history of this country has the North been as polarised as it is now. It is polarised along political, ethnic, religious and economic lines. The gap between Moslems and Christians is widening by the day. The same applies to the growing social inequality in the region, the super-rich and the poor in this region lead parallel lives."
Adamu said, "the concept of the core north and the Middle Belt region is something we cannot run away from. Some of us believe that the attempt by the people of the Middle Belt region, also known as North Central zone, to create their own identity is inimical to core Northern interests."
"Its leaders are accused of attempting to divide the north. It seems to me that we have judged them without trying to find out what their problems or their worries are we should know that this agitation has a long political history dating back to the years before independence."
He lamented the uncoordinated voices representing the North in the centre and said that "the political, social and economic interests of the North are ill-served by the multiplicity of voices."
Said he: "We must have one voice and one voice only. That voice should emerge from our deliberations at this forum. This must be the beginning of a sincere effort to pull us back from the precipice and make the North what Sir Ahmadu Bello sacrificed his life for - a people united and bound with a code of common cause.
At the climax of the deliberations, the Chairman of the Governors' Summit, Alhaji Saminu Turaki complained of the attempt by President Olusegun Obasanjo to frustrate the conference.
He told the stakeholders that Obasanjo had prevented all his ministers and special advisers from the region from attending the conference, which was to find lasting solutions to the problems of the north.
The chairman of ACF, Chief Sunday Awoniyi told The Guardian that Obasanjo should take a more elaborate step of promoting ethnic harmony among the people rather than fanning embers of disunity. He said:
According to Awoniyi, the president sent a message of praise to the meeting of the Yoruba elders in Ibadan on November 26, 2004. And for the Federal Government to imagine that the gathering chaired by Gowon, of all people, supported by the Sultan of Sokoto could be designed to polarise this country is most unfortunate indeed.
"Won't it have been helpful to have sent a message of goodwill and encouragement to the meeting called by the entire leadership of the North, to seek peace instead of a letter of implied rebuke and condemnation," he asked.
"They want to emphasise the elements that divide us rather than elements that will improve our togetherness. Nobody is going to intimidate us, enough is enough, nobody is going to intimidate us from working for peace, mutual accommodation because without this there cannot be room for economic and political development and elevation from the poverty of our people."`
According to Awoniyi, the president sent a message of praise to the meeting of the Yoruba elders in Ibadan on November 26, 2004. And for the Federal Government to imagine that the gathering chaired by Gowon, of all people, supported by the Sultan of Sokoto could be designed to polarise this country is most unfortunate indeed
