WHY
MUST “POWER SHIFT”?
By Babayola Toungo <babayolatoungo@yahoo.co.uk>
Aug 26, 2006
The clamour for power
shift by disparate political groups across the country has taken a life
of its own to the detriment of issues. The fad now is to shout loudest
as to the desirability of your local area to produce the President or
else the world will come to an end. No one among the plethora of these
later day irredentist gives a hoot about what they will do with the
power once it is “shifted” to their locality or what may be in it for
the average poor man. Power must just “shift” for its own sake and as
the shortest way possible to gaining access to the nation’s treasury.
The noise has reached a nuisance level and is actually polluting our
political airwaves. Among our so-called frontline politicians, non
cares about issues based politics but rather how to make sure that
certain political offices are “allocated” to his locality. This is the
line of thought of our surfeit of counterfeit politicians, holding court
nationwide with their court jesters, telling their illiterate people
that they are their knights in shining armour who are here to
“wrestle” their rights for them from neo-oppressors, be they the hated
Hausa and Fulani who have “cornered” the oil resources found in the
Niger Delta; or the ubiquitous Almajiri wandering the streets
with no certainty of the present much less contemplate a future that
holds more uncertainties for him.
My beef today with these
agitators is not their misplaced agitation per se, but on whose
behalf are they making this pandemonium in the name of power shift. Why
do failed politicians always make the most noise purportedly on behalf
of the ordinary man who daily toil from dawn to dusk just so he could be
able to swallow anything that may past for food to keep him alive for
yet another day of toil and turmoil. The ordinary man in Ajegunle, or
Aguleri or Umuleri or Modakeke or Kona or Kamba or Wulari or Yofo or
Yakoko is all the same and cares little about who happens to be on the
saddle so long as his daily needs could be met. These daily needs may
not be more than food, education for his kids, healthcare delivery for
his family and security of his life and property. It is you and I that
constitute the stumbling block to the unfettered growth of democracy in
this country. I am very particular with the power shifters from the
northern part of the country.
Power has been domiciled
in the north, according to those against candidates from this area,
since time immemorial. But no one is yet to convince me on how the
average northerner benefited from the length of time that northerners
held sway at the centre. We have the largest number of unemployed; the
least number of students in tertiary institutions, the military and all
security organs; we are not in commerce, financial institutions,
telecommunications, and any sector you can think of. Infrastructures in
the north have long since atrophied; our state of healthcare delivery
leaves much to be desired; agriculture, the backbone of the north has
long been criminally neglected. Our vast resources are yet to be
harnessed. So what did the north benefit from its hold on power in the
past and what do our politicians hope to do with power once they manage
to get back onto the saddle? Ask the farmer around the Goronyo dam
whose land was confiscated to make way for an irrigation project that is
yet to take-off 25 years after it was supposed to be completed; or the
millions of small business owners who were forced to go under by the non
availability of energy sources to propel his business; or the textile
worker that was asked to stay home because his employer cannot operate
anymore due to lack of cotton from the farmer, whose access to chemicals
and equipment has been closed by his state chief executive sitting idly
by and waiting for the monthly manna from Abuja which in turn will be
used to pay for his families healthcare and children’s school fees in
Europe and the Americas.
The bulk of the aspirants
to the presidency come 2007 are serving governors from the northern part
of Nigeria and they are among those who have exhausted their two-term
constitutional limit of eight years and therefore are now looking up –
the ultimate office in politics. But pray, what have they done to their
immediate constituencies as governors to give them the courage to aspire
for higher office? The north that they want us to believe they have the
interest of its people at heart is the most backward area of Nigeria.
Most of the things the federal government is supposed to do for the
states falls within the concurrent legislative list – what has these
governors done on their part to ameliorate the problems of their states
and their citizens? Take agriculture for instance. Over 80% of the
land mass of the north is arable with different crops cultivatable
compared to South Africa’s 20% arable land. The north provided the bulk
of the food crop for the nation and as a matter of fact was the sole
producer of groundnuts and cotton. Groundnuts were exported and the
abundance of cotton was responsible for establishment of textile
industries in Kaduna and Kano. Kano was actually known for its
groundnuts pyramids. But today neither the pyramids nor the textile
mills are evident. What has our northern governors done to revive the
agricultural sector – the single biggest employer of labour for our
people. Those among them who aspire to be president, do they intend to
turn the country into another north – a metaphor for wasted
opportunities.
State roads are no more
than the roads constructed by Babangida’s Directorate of Federal Roads
and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI). If we are to hold Obasanjo
responsible for the state of our federal roads, who do we hold
responsible for those roads that are owned by the states? Every single
sector of our socio-economic life is a tale of woes. Almost every state
in the south has embarked on the construction of an Independent Power
Project (IPP) to augment the epileptic supply from NEPA (or is it PHCN?),
how many states in the north have thought of one? The Dadin Kowa dam
was built with a hydroelectric component for the supply of electricity.
What is the state of the dam today? The Mambilla Hydroelectric Power
project has been on the drawing board since 1986. It has the capacity
to generate 2,500Kw of electricity, five times the capacity of Kainji
dam in full production and the whole body of water to be utilised for
the project lies within the borders of Nigeria. What happened to the
Goronyo Dam, where hundreds of people were killed in 1981 in the course
of construction of the dam meant for the provision of irrigation
services to the farmers around the Sokoto Rima River Basin? Jigawa and
Kano states alone can boast of at least 44 dams but our people are still
hungry.
What has been the level
of inter-state economic activities among the northern states? What has
the governments done to ensure that a conducive atmosphere exists for
the people of the area to interact commercially with their brethren
across the north? There appears to be more trade between the states of
the north and the south than between the northern states. Who among the
governors ever thought of exploiting the various resources assumed to
be underneath our feet? There are endless questions and no answers.
The north is more of an orphan politically.
What happened to our
educational institutions, particularly the secondary schools? We are
now afraid for our children to write the WAEC so therefore we register
them for NECO. Our schools have been left to the vagaries of weather
and the lack of equipment. Our leaders find it easier to build mansions
than build laboratories and libraries. Most of our children completed
the secondary school phase of their education without ever coming across
a microscope beyond its design in textbooks. How do we want them to
become doctors or engineers? I don’t believe our governors ever take
the time to know the number of intakes into our tertiary institution and
its percentages. We are all products of free education, that is why a
poor man like me from Yola could be able to write. Instead of
rehabilitating our laboratories, dormitories and classromms we are more
enamoured by the number of new schools we ‘opened’ not how many of our
students passed the WAEC and are able to get placement in our tertiary
institutions. Instead of stocking our libraries with the most
up-to-date journals and text books, we prefer to carry an executive
baggage made up of commissioners, advisers, special assistants, and even
executive pimps whose only brief may be the organisation of parties and
procument of young girls for their excellencies.
What happened in 2003?
Where were those who now suddenly remember ‘gentleman’s agreement’ on
power shift? Why must power “shift”? Why are we scared of elections?
Are we truly ready to govern Nigeria in a manner obtainable in civilised
climes?
I for one is against
p[ower shift (or rotation or whatever variant that may come by way of
political arrangement among the politicians). We “shifted” power to the
South West to “pacify” our Yoruba brothers for the injustice of June 12th
and look at what we got - a disaster by whatever definition personified
by Obasanjo. If I will have my way, no governor from the northern part
of Nigeria will come close to the corridors of power any more. Yes,
power must shift. But it should shift from the shoulders of purposeless
leadership to one that is focused and purposeful. From those that the
sound of sirens have numbed their thinking faculties and are beginning
to believe they are tin gods to those who believe they will meet God in
the hereafter and be held accountable for their deeds.
While the likes of Gbenga
Daniel and Olusegun Agagu are thinking of N60billion energy project for
their states and Donald Duke is building the Tinapa, Africa’s premier
business resort, our governors are beating their chests yelling at us at
the number of pilgrims they sent to Saudi Arabia and Israel and they
want us to make them president of Nigeria. The north is blessed with
abundant land, water, sunlight and wind. Show me one state that has
utilised any of the above energy sources for the benefit of its people.
One of the northern state governors as president? I would rather vote
for Nzeribe or Chris Uba than any of the northern state governors.
