It’s barely less than two years to the 2023 general election in the country and politicians have since began putting their houses in order and all strategies in place to give them latitude of winning elections at various level.
Slightly more than two years down the line, some elected officials have already gotten the scale swinging on their favour due to some apparent manifestations within the political cycles. It’s either one is being endeared by his high level of developmental strides in both human and capital indices or his intelligence in managing political structures around him- but in a most favourable situation, having both the leverages is the best.
In 2019, Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya was elected the governor of Gombe state under the podium of the All Progressive Congress (APC), defeating the former deputy speaker of the national assembly, Sen. Usman Bayero Nafada of then the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the state.
It’s in record that, Inuwa Yahaya has scored the total of 364,197 votes against the Nafada’s 222.868 votes, representing the difference of 141,329 votes. And looking at the numerical variance between the duo, one will deduced that APC leadership in the state need to do extra work to retain power beyond 2023, even though chances are apparently very dicey and ticklish.
By all indicators, Inuwa Yahaya is losing the political grip in the state. In the last two years, he brought policies that are antipeople as they are mostly frown at.
The disbandment of thousands of youths employed by the previous administration of Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo to man security at wards and schools, traffic and environment; tactical suspension of the newly established Gombe State University of Science and Technology situated in Kumo, Akko local government; withdrawal of land titles under the pretence of rolling out development plans; poor funding of other state owned tertiary institutions, the list is endless.
Also, his major problem is ‘poor’ rewarding mechanism, particularly to the politicians who have worked from thick and thin to make sure he won his election in 2019 against all odds – Sen. Goje stood clearly as the rallying pillar upon which all those supported Inuwa lean on. He a part from making assiduous effort to see that none of those who contested and lost the primary election with Inuwa left the party, he make sure he brought people like; Jamil Isyaku Gwamna, Audu Hammasaleh, Bala Tinka among others to the fold of the APC before the general election.
But as it’s now, most of them seems either not part of the system or decided to remain silent for obvious reasons not beyond what an ordinary person on the street is thinking, let alone politicians who are part of the game.
Basically, you can’t mobilize people to work for your success project for almost a decade and after succeeding you seem to behave as if you are the only one who worked and suffered for such a success – it doesn’t work that way, people are part of the journey and whatever leisure comes with such success it is paramount to involve such great pillars and political foot soldiers. Nobody is saying that Inuwa should not work but human capital development and empowerment are undergird to inclusive governance.
In the history of Gombe state politics – no one has ever enjoys the collective goodwill of both the masses and the political class like Governor Inuwa Yahaya, most of the politicians work with their finance during the days of his campaign and he knew this more than anyone.
Today, many projects aren’t of priority to the people if needs assessment would be put in to use – worrisomely, there have been serious allegations that most of the contracts were highly inflated, a typical example is the Solar street light project which is a clear misplaced priority, imagine someone who claimed there is no fund in the state to run a state owned University of Technology is putting such project at nearly N7bn.
Let him not forget the fact that, the success doesn’t belongs to him alone, it belongs to his entire crew, the APC and the entire people of the state.
There is a genuine rising complaints that the Governor has ‘monopolize’ everything under his government, that all ‘goodies’ revolves around his table, including petty stuff – this is not good for those who have worked for him and it will not end well with them.
This is 2021, few months to 2023 uproar – the caliber of people complaining about him covertly and overtly, who were his true loyalist should be a worrying concern to him and work against him in 2023.
The earlier he understand this simple fact the better for him – one good thing he should continue to remember is that, his popularity was never the basis that brought him into power – there was a crack in the ruling party then, it was such crack that consolidate the opposition at that time to pave way for his success. Should this same political class chooses to work against him, I doubt if he will be able to contain the heat.
In fact, ousted governor Bindo has built roads and other infrastructures in Adamawa but it is similar feud that consumes him, the earlier the Governor shine his eyes the better for him.
Today, both Barrister M A Abubakar and Bindo had wish they treated people otherwise of how they did – in both Bauchi and Adamawa state respectively.
A stitch in time saves nine!
Abdullahi writes from Abuja
