Wednesday, 6th April, was the day Governor Bello Mohammed Matawallen Maradun received His Eminence, the Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III in Gusau to perform two important functions at the Government House which, invariably, underscore one of the cardinal responsibility of a responsible administration anywhere in a society such as ours.
No doubt, traditional rulers and the Clergy constitute the dedrock of cohesion in our society. Their welfare and wellbeing largely determine the action and direction of the followership.
There is hardly any Muslim Notherner that does not look upon a clergy or traditional ruler to determine his action or inaction in the society. Hence, they form the compass for the direction to which people follow.
In realisation of this important trend, Gov. Matawalle fulfilled the yearnings of these two important bodies by providing the traditional rulers with befitting transportation system, and the Clergy with a befitting Secretariat which they sought for to facilitate easy regular convergence to find direction and cohesion for their followership.
These remarkable gestures by the governor, however, did not go down well with many individuals most of whom perpetually find fault in every action or inaction of the government. They brand these gestures as waste, misplacement of priority and, hence, unnecessary.
They observe that the funds spent on the traditional rulers and the clergymen should have been channelled to security, the IDPs, the health or the education sector.
Good observations indeed.
However, the Hausa man has a saying that “bikin Magaji ba ya hana na Magajiya”, which in effect means the Government cannot neglect one aspect of its responsibility for another. That is why before the governor bought these vehicles for the traditional rulers, he first supplied 200 hundred brand new Hilux Vans, well equipped with communication gadgets, to all the security operatives in the state. This came along with monthly inprest to cater for their maintenance and, of course, allowances for officers on duty.
For those who felt the funds should go for the Health sector, there’s need to know that what the governor has done for the health sector supercedes all efforts made in the past. His unique effort is the revolutionary construction of primary health care facilities in the state. He has so far, built 147 50-bed primary health care facilities in all the 147 Wards of the state, equipped with a tricycle ambulance each for easy conveyance of more serious cases to bigger healthcare facilities.
Those who routed for the education sector must know that in the basic educatiin sector alone, Gov. Matawalle has addresed most of the dilapidated facilities in the state as well as built new ones. His administration has so far, provided no fewer than 3,000 blocks of classrooms and also new ones. All these are equipped with the relevant learning materials. He has also employed over 600 teachers to balance the teacher-student ratio in the basic education schools.across the state.
The issue of IDPs is a thorny one indeed. In more than a decade of insurgency, his administration takes responsibility of less than three years. When he took over the mantle of leadership, the former IG Mohammed Adamu Abubakar Committee report indicated that there were over 25,000 children that were ophaned and an equal number of women that were widowed. The previous administration,which was responsible for the emergence and dragonising the menace of banditry, did not do anything about it. That is not, however, to say the Matawalle administration cannot do its best to combat it.
I have always maintained, however, that the issue of IDPs is not the responsibility of the state Government alone. It is that of the donor agencies, those vocal NGOs who raked in fortune in the name civil activities , profit-making organisations and, indeed, wealthy individuals. This is because Zamfara State in a state of war. The state is bedeviled by a humanitarian crisis which calls for all hands to be on deck. Accusing the state government in this case is far away from addressing the subject matter.
In any case, the responsibility of any administration is to make sure that it touches the lives of every citizen as much as it can. That of Dr Bello Mohammed is not going to rest on its oars until every citizen of Zamfara State says, “na shaida”, by Allah’s grace.
Bappa is the Special Adviser to the Governor on Public Enlightenment and Media.
