Governor Rabiu Kwankwaso of Kano State is among the contenders for the presidential ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC) ahead of the 2015 general elections. Kwankwaso, in this piece, unfolds his agenda for Nigeria.
Today I look at Nigeria and I feel sorry for the high level of insecurity and other challenges that stare our nation on the face and I feel that something urgent must be done to address the rot in the system. Nigeria cannot continue to operate as an orphan in the comity of nations having been abundantly blessed with human and material resources to be a global leader.
I can replicated Kano’s success story for Nigeria
I believe that I can change the sad story of Nigeria to something of a celebration if given the opportunity to lead. I have the confidence that I can replicate the Kano magic for Nigeria. Today, Kano is proud that I came to the scene in 2011 and change the landscape for them.
Despair and hopelessness have been replaced with happiness on the faces of the people of Kano. Dilapidated public institutions have been replaced with new ones while the poor have been integrated into the system and given a means of livelihood and taken off the streets.
Today, as a result of my leadership in Kano, I have succeeded in establishing three brand new cites known as Kwankwasiyya, Amana and Bandirawo in addition to constructing three monumental flyovers that have helped to remove the traffic snarl in the metropolis. I have also provided 220kms of dualised and electrified roads to all the 44 LGAs of the state translating to 5kms for each of the councils at the cost of N80 billion.
To get the city running without power failure, I have signed and MoU for 35 Megawatts Independent Power Project at Challawa and Tiga dams at the cost of N14.2 billion solely from the state coffers.
Free, compulsory education
Under my administration, we have made education free and compulsory from the primary to the university. Behind that we have a special post graduate training programme for graduates who pass out with First class or Second class upper grades. So for our graduates, all you need to secure further training by the government is to pass with at least a second class upper. For those who are reading medicine, we engage them as workers on G/L 7 while they are still studying.
When they graduate we send them abroad to study in specialised areas so as to become specialists and more useful to the society. So far, we have trained 501 youths for postgraduate studies abroad at the cost of N1.8 billion. Another set of 100 youths has been dispatched to Jordan for Piloting and Aeronautical Engineering studies at the cost of N1 billion. Another 100 of our youths are studying Medicine in various universities abroad at the cost of N1 billion. One hundred others are pursuing courses in Pharmacy overseas at the cost of N800million while 100 females are studying Medicine with specialisation in Gynaecology at the cost of N1 billion.
At the same time, while 25 have been sponsored to study Marine Engineering in India and the United Kingdom, 14 others are undergoing various courses in Technical Education at Bradford, England. The second batch of our 502 youths sponsored by my administration to pursue their PhD courses abroad is doing very well in their chosen institutions across the globe. We are spending at least N2.8 billion on them.
Overall we have set up 37 micro finance firms and 44 educational institutions to help the people of Kano to actualise their dreams in life. These things are being done because we believe that the people must be made comfortable for the government to elicit their support, goodwill and cooperation to succeed. We place premium on our people and we will continue to do more to advance their interest and well being because without them there can be no government.
That is why I have established two first class universities in Kano to continue to provide knowledge for our people and citizens of Nigeria. These two institutions are designed with the future in mind and to remain as centres of excellence at all times.
How sanity was restored on Kano roads
The Kano State Traffic Road Traffic Agency, KAROTA, was set up to restore sanity in the state. Many residents of Kano fear them more than any other thing because I gave them instruction to arrest anyone, no matter their position once they flout traffic laws.
I told them also that if you arrest any commissioner or top government officials for contravening traffic rule and they dare mention my name that they should double their penalties. The agency is working well. Nobody, who likes themselves, would want to beat traffic in Kano because they understand the implications of such an action. If you catch anybody and he mentions my name double their penalty. That has helped KAROTA to keep the traffic under control.
Empowerment for all
Now you have seen that there is no beggar among Kwankwasya. We have enough jobs for all and if you don’t want to do any work, just go to your house and die. It is your own business. You cannot hope to be getting cash from me. We have trained people on how to struggle for their daily work and people have keyed into it and it is working for them. Everyone wants to do something in order to earn a decent living instead of begging on the streets of Kano and we are happy about that.
What we did by banning street begging or Almajiri, is paying off today. People are talking of producing things by themselves. We believe we have done well and we will continue to do more for the people.
Almajiris off the streets of Kano
We have a child labour law in the state and it is meant to protect the children and give them a better future. We want to prevent a situation whereby some people, who have money, go into the villages and take young children to their houses and use them as slaves while their children are going to the best of schools. We have stopped that in the state and anyone caught using children as slaves will go to jail.
Anyone who took someone’s children and does not intend to train them in school like their own children should return them to their parents without wasting time. We want a situation whereby the poor children will go to the same schools with the children of the rich ones in our midst.
We have established many institutions to provide opportunities for all to actualise their educational goals. We abolished Almajiris because it constituted a nuisance to all and contributed to the rising crime rate in the state. We have given loans to go into business and run other projects that would help them live happily.
No borrowing since we started working for Kano
In terms of security, we have also improved on a lot of things to strengthen the Government House and other places in the state and promote peace. All these things we have done them without borrowing money. The state government has done them without borrowing from within or outside Nigeria. It is our policy not to borrow any money.
In fact, even the N77 billion we inherited as debt, we have only N20 billion outstanding. We have also exited from the $200 million we inherited from the World and bank and other creditors. We got out of the debt traps.
Why Kano people are happy, comfortable
Some of our landmark projects are being financed through the money we have saved from prudent management of our resources. One of them is the power generation scheme, which is costing us N14.4 billion, the flyer over and others were done with our earned resources. We took some measures to assist us to get to where we are today. Before we came here the payment of salaries was a big problem. Before we came here no civil servant was sure when their salary would come.
But now nobody cares about it because it is promptly taken care of by my administration. At any given point in time, we have at least one month salary set aside in the treasury for the workers. We have also taken some measures to ensure that we have enough money to prosecute our projects and programmes. One of the measures was to cut down overheads.
When I came in I discovered that overhead constituted a very serious source of wastage because ministries that received the money were just using formula to share it among the commissioners, permanent secretaries and other senior government officials. Then I decided to use the 2003 amount I was paying to the respective ministries and parastatals instead of 2011 and we calculated and discovered that the difference was over N500 million a month. So, I decided that we should go back to the 2003 benchmark.
Even though some commissioners struggle to get an increase they often fail to convince or prove what they claim when they come to the State Executive Council. So we are saving over N500 million a month and we are able to save about N6billion a year. In fact, that amount is the cost of one of the flyover bridges in the state capital. That is one of those long flyovers.
No First Lady Office in Kano
We also saved money by not allowing the Office of the First Lady in Kano. We know that a lot of money is being spent in that office elsewhere but we in Kano believe strongly that whatever the first lady should do, is what the Ministry of Women Affairs is doing and there is therefore no need to duplicate such functions in the state. We just need a good commissioner to do the job and get a good wife and keep her at home to manage the home front well. That is what we are doing here and everybody is happy.
Our families don’t go to ministries or to go and bother any commissioner. And I don’t encourage any friendship of our families to come visiting her so that we don’t run into crisis.
By the time your wife begins to benefit from a particular commissioner- whether good or bad- he will be the best in the government. And by the time she tells you 100 times at the right time you will be forced to believe her.
No security vote in Kano
Another area we have saved money to develop the state is in the area of Security Vote. Security vote is the money that governors and other people are collecting without accounting and that encourages corruption and that is why we don’t operate security vote in Kano State. Whatever we want to buy, we write it in black and white to show clearly where it is going and why. Otherwise we have seen a situation here where in four years certain persons collected over N10 billion under the name of Reciprocal Arrangement.
So, all these things put together and many other things gave us the money to do what we have done. We have also been very prudent in the management of our resources to the extent that the longest flyover we have built which is two Kilometres long is completed at the cost of N10 billion. The other flyover is completed at the cost of N5.9 billion. In some other states the amount we have spent to complete the real projects would have been insufficient for consultancy fees.
So, the things we have been able to achieve so far have given us hope and happiness and we are comfortable here in Kano. Our people are happy and satisfied with our effort to change things for them.
We are addressing security challenges Of course, we are facing some security challenges but we are up to the task and are handling the situation appropriately. Of course, you cannot stop anybody from crossing his fence into another man’s house to commit crime. It has been happening over the years but our capacity is such that whoever decides to commit crime would be caught within a short time and dealt with in accordance with the laws of the land.
That is why sometimes we have attacks but it is difficult to have the kind of coordinated attacks we had in 2012 across the state because they took us by surprise. Now we are wiser and we are working and not sleeping because our primary responsibility as a government is to protect lives and property of the citizens.
Initially, I was one of those who did not support state police but because of what we saw in the last few years, I am one of the proponents of state police. We have seen a situation even in Kano State when we were turbaning our Emir- I don’t know what happened- we were doing our job and not interfering with anybody’s job either here or elsewhere, some elements were used to cause trouble here. But we have moved on as a people.
However since that incident, out of the 75 policemen we had they have only returned 25 to us. And these are some of the issues that made me to change my mind and support state police. Let me say that we will continue to do what is right to ensure that we have peace and progress and development in the state of Kano.
Why I am consulting for 2015 Presidency
I am sure that you aware of what is happening politically in the country. As a party, the All Progressives Congress, we are working round the clock to ensure the success of the 2015 elections. Let me also say that over last two years or so, many of my friends, brothers and sisters as well as well wishers have been requesting me to contest the Presidency but I have been telling them that time is of essence and that I need to consult. It is not my own project or my family project but that of the entire country.
Now I am in the process of consultation and I have been going to many places to consult people on the matter.We want to consult those we should consult so that when we are through you can consult the rest of Nigerians on our behalf. If my consultation results in running, I believe that I have what it takes to move Nigeria forward. All my life, I have been working for the benefit of society and I don’t want to shy away from making my services available to the people of Nigeria despite the numerous challenges we face today as a nation.
I believe that with good leadership these challenges can be overcome once and for all. Am happy that I have had the right training as an engineer, who solves problems and I have traversed the length and breadth of this country meeting people, working with them and seeking solutions to the problems of this great country. If I decide to run, I would use my requisite experience to address the fundamental socio-economic challenges facing Nigeria and give the people a new lease of life.
I am confident that given my background as a long standing public servant, an engineer and a one-time Nigeria’s Defence Minister, I perfectly understand what this country urgently needs in order to become great among the comity of nations. More than anything else, the worsening security threat to Nigeria and the seeming inability of the administration to address it, do not make things easy at all. We need to do something fast to give Nigerians a sense of hope and succour in a country they all love and believe in.
More should be done to improve security in Nigeria
Let me take this opportunity to appeal to the Federal Government to do more on the issue of security. Security is very important and it is very sad that we are witnessing the crisis in our time. Any time I remember it I feel very sad. As we speak, we have over four million Nigerians who are being displaced into Chad, Niger, and Cameroun and so on. Some are hiding on the hills, some have been admitted to hospitals and some are missing.
So whether you are a Christian or Muslim, whether you are a northerner or Southerner, or whichever group you may belong to, I don’t think that this is a good story about our country, Nigeria. What is happening is not only happening to Christians or Muslims, it is not only happening to northerners or Southerners, especially those who have not been to the North, they would not know that we have so many Southerners living in Chibok, living in Gworza and Madagali and many other parts that we are talking about today, have also been displaced.
We have brothers and sisters from all parts of Nigeria here in Kano. It is a fact that after the civil war none of the property of any Nigerian from other parts of the country was seized in any part of Kano. Those who fled to the East came back and took over their homes and shops. But a situation where leadership is encouraging this division, you begin to wonder what they want to achieve. As far as we are concerned, we should not encourage any form of division.
I want to appeal to all Nigerians to ensure that there is peace in this country. Only weak leaders are encouraging this division. Here we, we don’t do it but show people what we have been able to achieve and not weaknesses and abusing people who should ordinarily be protected. Let me also advise our National Assembly members that they support the election of 2015. That is highly critical and I was disappointed when someone said that the election was not on the table.
I am happy that there are many other tables in this country and not only the table of the man who spoke and we have an election on our table. Our table is very important and the table of the masses in this country and no clever or wise politicians will support the issue of tenure extension. Term limit is very important and we have to stick to it and ensure that a free and fair election is conducted in this country. Many of us are surprised that today we havesole candidates and we don’t know why the party did that.
But we know that there were primary elections from 1999 to 2011 in PDP even when we had sitting presidents in 2003 and 2011. And to us, primary election is key to strengthening any political party. From 1999 to 2011 all the elections were being won by the party that was doing primary elections. All the parties that were not doing primary elections none won elections at the centre from 1999 to 2011.
By the grace of God, the APC will conduct free, fair and transparent primary elections and from that we can extrapolate and see that that party will now swap positions. That party will lose election and the one that will do primaries will win elections in Nigeria. Running away from elections by politicians is like a washer man, who does not want tap water.
When the kitchen is too hot one should look for another place where they can fit into. Some of them were telling us that they don’t support third term and that third term will not work. They support him because the door is closed and they cannot get out and everyone wants to get a favour and they know that third term will never work in this country and has never worked anywhere. It will never work here.
Term limit is the key. Even in areas where dictatorship operates, we have seen the consequences of trying to adopt undemocratic tactics in dealing with the people. We want to appeal to our colleagues in the National Assembly to ensure that they don’t support what is unjust but to stand firm with the Nigerian people in giving them their rights at all times.
Industrialisation of Kano
Electricity is so expensive to produce and run factories. The public power supply is unstable and the cost of maintaining generators is very high. But we want to bring in 35 mega watts of power to change the situation to boost industrialisation before we go. We have a market here. But a bigger problem of industrialisation has to do with policy somersault by the Federal Government.
Today, the federal government would say it has banned this item, tomorrow they say we have not banned it because of pressure from certain quarters. When you say you are banning it means that the local people will produce the items but once they allow such items to come in, the local producers are put out of job. Cost of production is high here and the goods that come in become cheaper thereby encouraging outsiders to sell their goods better in Nigeria than the local producers.
We have to check smuggling also and control interest rates in the bank. These are the major challenges to industrialisation in Kano and Nigeria. Unless something urgent is done about security nobody will come to invest in a place that he is not sure of his life. Security is very important to every investor. Today you see people being murdered as if they are in the abattoir and it is very scary.
The management of information is also important. We have never seen what is happening in this country before. The frontline is everywhere in Nigeria-streets, mosques, palaces, Nyanya and all other places. Before now, people avoided certain places but now nobody knows where the bad elements will strike next.
What is Kwankwasiya?
In this game you have to come up with something that is sellable and you have to go to the people to tell them that the product you are bringing is good especially given that here in Kano the politics has often been characterised by groups and so on. When we started we had the Rimi group, the Aminu Kano group and the NPN side and so on. But we the younger ones had no group but we opportune to know the late Aminu Kano and had read so much about him and we decided to come up with that ideology of Aminu Kano.
We worked so hard to get here. The colour is of Kwankwasiya is from Aminu Kano’s red and white and black. That was the colour of the Peoples Redemption Party of Aminu Kano. So, if you are talking of the red colour it is from there.
And secondly, the people here are more of NEPU and NPC and so on. And you see on the other hand, we have an identity in Kwankwasiya so that it makes it difficult for any of our members to go and do something that is negative to society. Our identity keeps us on our toes. We don’t want to do anything that will make people feel bad.
We are determined people, who work hard anywhere they may be. All the things we have done have to do with our ideology. People associated with us cannot steal and engage in corruption because the system does not allow people to steal government money.
Sabongari’s development and security Sabongari means several things to people. It is an economic centre and a place where so many things happen simultaneously. For instance, the longest flyover we are doing in the state is in Sabongari. We are deliberately working to open up Sabongari. No fewer than eight roads are being done in Sabongari in addition to the longest flyover currently being constructed in the area.
As a policy we will take more roads in Sabongari because it is easier to do roads there because there is little or no encroachment there. All these roads we are doing affect everybody in Kano. There is no need for people to fear whether we will complete the projects started by Kwankwaso or not. We have started the projects and we are committed to completing them. If we don’t, my successor will certainly complete them.
Our priority is to change the way things are going in Sabongari, which constitutes one of the biggest drugs market in the state. Here you find some people displaying drugs as if it is water and bread.
They pack small containers with illicit drugs like cocaine, heroin and Indian helm and you see some people taking them and behaving as if they are out of this world. But we cannot as a government allow such a dangerous practice to go on here. Within the last three years we have in conjunction with security agencies seized and destroyed illicit drugs worth N4 billion from Sabongari Market. The raid will continue until all the bad elements that are into the trade are flushed out.
And when we get the masterminds we teach them a lesson no matter who they are and who their backers are because they are a threat to the society.
Social security
We are taking care of people who are handicapped and cannot do any type of work. We are concerned about their welfare. For that reason, we pay each of them N10,000 monthly to cushion the effect of their handicap and give them a sense of belonging. When I came into office, minimum wage for pensioners was N135 and we moved it to N5000. We are still looking at areas to make it better. Click to signup for FREE news updates, latest information and hottest gists everyday
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But your Boko Haram project is killing innocent souls especially the Igbos.
ReplyDeleteWonderful. Wonderful. I am not surprised at the feat of this young man not with a PhD in engineering fro England's Loughborough University of Technology. With all his relevant experience this man can provide good leadership for Nigeria. He needs our support.
ReplyDeleteDo you want us to clap for you Mr Governor? Before I say something, may I beg you to come remove other beggars from the Lagos streets that are from Kano, the gate men, Okada riders etc. Now just one word for you, all these achievements of yours cannot qualify you to be an alternative to Nigeria problem. You proud yourself of using State money for all these achievement? Where did the money come from? People like you are using the insecurity situation in the Country as a reason to treble the minds of Nigerians, the security your people created. Well the Nigerian Problem goes beyond insecurity. Our Problem is our minds,in our attitudes and values. The very moment the North, the West, East and the minorities look at each other as equal partners in this project called Nigeria, then things will change. If this is not the case, then there is no hope for the project Nigeria. Look at the just concluded confab, there is clear indication that no one trust each other and while is that? The simple answer is injustice. Would Nigeria be where we are now if the Jonathan/Sambo administration was given all the support they needed? The answer is no. And what makes the next President thinks that he will get the support? So we will continue to get back to square one, unless we change our mind set.
ReplyDeleteThank you. You have said it perfectly well.
DeleteTell us you will stop awoof of Niger delta money when your region is full killers and ignorance with poverty.
DeleteNo first Lady Office in Kano hahahah, which one of them will you create an office for Mr Governor? Puppet achievements I see in this right up. Is not convincing enough to make us believe you can solve Nigeria problem. Any aspirants that tells me how he can heal the wounds in Nigeria, bridge the hatred in the Country and bring everyone to love one another, then I will say here is our hope. Until the you are all liars and thief seeking opportunity to enrich yourselves.
ReplyDeleteChief Boko Haram sponsor, kwankwaso. I laugh when I see this your useless so call manifesto. You and your Boko Haram brothers did not give the man that is presently there chance, you want others to give you chance, no way
ReplyDeleteTell us what happen to local gov funds for three good years which total to N225 billion according to GEJ. You refuse to conduct local govt election for three years, is that how you want to run Nigeria?
ReplyDeleteNigerian Defence Academy admission 2015/2016 is presently on. For help or assistance to get into NDA contact General yakubu on 09090787073. for urgent help THANK YOU.
ReplyDelete