The Nation Newspaper

Category: Commentaries

  • The rise of women in Ogun

    The rise of women in Ogun

    Sir: If the Athenians of the first century were around to day, they would surely be heading for Ogun State to observe at close quarters the Senator Ibikunle Amosun (SIA) model of governance.

    Secular and religious records bear witness that these ancient Greeks “spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new things”. Visitors were mostly welcome only if they came along with strange ideas. It was a path dictated by Socrates who had lived centuries earlier.

    In this case, our friends, the Athenians, would particularly be interested in Ogun State because of Amosun’s most recent political innovation of allocating strategic seats in the judiciary of Ogun to women.

    In a coup d’état of sorts, Amosun swore in women to take charge of the commanding heights in the judiciary. At the historic event in Abeokuta, the capital, the governor himself admitted that what he was doing was quite novel in a patriarchal society such as ours.

    He swore in Mrs Abimbola Akeredolu as the first female Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice of Ogun State since the creation of state in 1976. Her appointment brought to 13 the number of women in the cabinet of Ogun State.

    That figure, in parenthesis, is the highest in the cabinet of any state government in Nigeria.

    On the same day and at the same event, the governor unveiled Mrs Patricia Oduniyi as the Solicitor-General and Permanent Secretary in the Justice Ministry. He equally had the honour to swear in the first female Chief Judge of Ogun State, Mrs Olatokunbo Olopade, who was present at the inauguration of the two women. What a triumphal triumvirate!

    The importance of the event wasn’t lost on Amosun, nor on all those who have since been mulling the latest achievement of his administration. He said what the world had witnessed was unprecedented in Ogun State.

    We all must see what Governor Amosun has done as a revolutionary move that goes beyond a fulfilment of the so-called principle of Affirmative Action. The point is that the world has moved beyond the frontiers of the Beijing Declaration of 1995 which called for 30% allocation of public or political office to women.

    The new thinking is no longer about sheer number of women in power. It is about qualitative representation of the fair sex in administration of politics, the economy, sports and indeed in all strata of society. It is about having women strutting in the corridors of power.

    For too long, we’ve run our society along male-centric lines that have only stunted full progress of our people and made nonsense of our huge expenditure on manpower and infrastructure.

    A wider involvement of women in the affairs of society especially at the apex as indicated by the step Amosun has taken means engaging a critical sector of society in nation-building. It’s a new thinking we must support if society must move on to new heights of advancement in the 21st century. The so-called Asian Tigers are making it because they have leveraged governance and politics for women over the years. No wonder the region has produced more female heads of state and government than any other area on Planet Earth!

    • Yetunde Oyefeso,

    Iperu Remo, Ogun State.

     

  • Boko Haram: Paralysis is not an option

    Boko Haram: Paralysis is not an option

    The Islamist sect Boko Haram has proved more resourceful in modifying its insurgency tactics than the federal government in adapting its law enforcement strategy to the modern era. First, the sect briefly toyed with conventional warfare in fighting the state, partly provoked by the extrajudicial murder of its leader, Mohammed Yusuf. But recognising that it could not hope to make a major dent in the federal capacity to fight back, the sect simply adopted guerrilla tactics, thereby positioning itself to inflict demoralising blows on the state. Second, after realising that its ability to attack prominent targets, such as the United Nations building in Abuja and the Police Headquarters in the same city, was limited and offered only partial public relations advantages, it began redirecting the enormous resources required for major operations to small-scale but more widespread attacks on a sustained basis.

    The sect has still not changed its guerrilla tactics, but it has managed to inflict embarrassing losses on the state. Scores are now killed in bomb and gun attacks nearly on a daily basis. A wide swath of the North has become nearly ungovernable, and federal forces not only have their backs to the wall, in spite of their positive confessions to the contrary, they also have been pushed into embracing terrible reprisal measures certain to alienate the people. Worrisomely, with each Boko Haram attack and consequent reprisal from the state, the morale of the insurgents seem to soar. All they do is simply spring a surprise, sometimes far away from the theatre of war. If a bus park bombing or razing of a school would satisfy today’s purpose, abduction and killing of foreign workers would take care of tomorrow’s bloody craving. Sadly, the sect’s manoeuvrability has been met by official inflexibility that often seems to punish the innocent more than the insurgent.

    The Goodluck Jonathan government should be worried more than it has let out. While the president has proved flexible and even imaginative in hatching 2015 re-election strategies, he has not been as forthcoming or resourceful in designing measures to defeat Boko Haram. He has rejiggered the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) structure and staff, replenished the party’s Board of Trustees (BoT) with trusted strongmen, ruffled the feathers of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) by inoculating it against effectiveness, and manipulated executive clemency powers to sedate his home front against rebellion in the coming years. These tactics may prove dubiously effective in the long run, but they do not show lack of imagination and oomph. On the contrary, the war against terror has ossified into one brutal and retrogressive policy of pulverising the restive regions.

    The March 7 visit of Jonathan to Borno and Yobe States showed very clearly that no fresh thinking is expected from the government to fight the sect other than bluster and the continuing application of massive and sometimes undiscriminating force. This unfortunately is tantamount to paralysis. The more the state unleashes its fearsome arsenal, the more Boko Haram and its splinter groups are encouraged to keep on fighting, assured that in the long run their anarchist tactics would weary the government into submission or even achieve far more than they had hoped for at the start of their campaigns. It would not be out of place for the government to detach itself a little from the centenary project and 2015 re-election politics in order to concentrate its best efforts in formulating fresh initiatives to combat Boko Haram. Existing strategies have simply become impotent.

    The consequence of sticking to unworkable measures is to embolden the more flexible and proactive sect and its splinter groups and make the country dangerously susceptible to one fateful bombing that could push the country over the cliff and send the crisis spiralling out of control. While there is still time to tinker with solutions, let the Jonathan government come out with fresh options for consideration – anything but today’s paralysis; anything but waiting for the next attack and wondering for whom the bell would toll, the unwary citizen or the country itself.

     

  • Kudos to Ogun State NYSC

    SIR: I read the report of the expulsion of a youth corps member from Ogun State NYSC orientation camp in The Nation newspaper of Wednesday March 13, with much satisfaction on the action taken by the brave and exemplary state coordinator Barrister Theresa Anosike and the camp director Mrs Franca Ifon.

    There are age-old stipulated guidelines for the NYSC camping programme that prospective corps members are made to append their signatures to without compulsion before the commencement of the orientation camp. Any prospective corps member who felt that he or she could not abide by the rules and regulations of the programme due to any reason should have quietly taken the easy option of applying for exemption from the service, thus saving some tax payers money than going to the camp to constitute a cog in the wheel of the smooth running of the camping programme.

    It is most unfortunate that some dubious and recalcitrant Nigerians hide under the banner of one faith or the other to manifest severe unpatriotic and questionable primitive tendencies to subvert laid down rules and regulations. Discerning Nigerians weep for our dear country when you see funny pictures of masquerade-like and other manner of attires coming from corps members that have been condoned by unserious and lily- livered NYSC state coordinators and camp directors on flimsy grounds that dressing in official NYSC garbs is against their faith! Some of these religious bigots neither sing the national anthem nor recite the pledge.

    The NYSC should as a matter of policy exempt from service any Nigerian who feels that his/her faith should come before the Nigerian nation. These are the same people who will later metamorphose into dissidents or their sponsors, mired in religious fundamentalism that has continued to take our dear country to retrogression.

     

    •Kingsley Ike Okeke-Agulu (Ph.D)

    Federal College of Forestry, Jos.

  • Achebe: There was a man

    SIR: He was arguably the doyen of fiction and prose writing in the Nigerian literary world; his name rang like a bell even to the ears of the deaf. Professor Chinua Achebe of blessed memory was no doubt an icon and a figure to be reckoned with in the African literary world of giants.

    From a bright career in the Nigerian Broadcasting Service (NBS) to a prosperous endeavour in the world of literature, Achebe unarguably saw and conquered.

    In his widely read ‘Things Fall Apart’, Chinua Achebe eruditely depicted his full grasp of the Igbo culture; his sonorous exposition of the Igbo oral tradition in that book was exceptional and pictorial. The book has continued to generate global acceptability and increased market value after over five decades of publication. Since publication of ‘Things fall Apart’ by Heinemann Publishers on June 17, 1958, the book has been reputed to sell over eight million copies and had been translated into over 45 languages. All these lend credence to the fact that the late professor and novelist transcended the limitations of geographical and generational constraints in his literary career.

    Achebe’s literary dexterity was further brought to bear on his subsequent works, some of which included No longer at Ease, Arrow of God, Man of the People and Chike at the River. The admirable thing about a good number of Achebe’s writings was that they tended to conceptualise the Igbo traditional culture in the midst of emerging modern life realities. Most of his works published in the fifties and sixties were directed to a pictorial appreciation of the cultural conflict that pervaded the Igbo society in the wake of the emerging religion of Christianity. No doubt, Achebe brought reality into fiction.

    With a combination of memoir, historical analysis and poetry, the foremost literary icon in ‘There was a Country’ relayed his personal experiences of the Nigerian civil war of 1967-1970 which nearly saw the secession of the Igbo ethnic group of Nigeria under the leadership of Dim Odumegwu Ojukwu.

    Achebe lived for his people; he was an epitome of a true Igbo par excellence, despite his great learning, he never despised his culture, despite his long sojourn, he never sacrificed his Igbo originality on the altar of exposure.

    Professor Chinua Achebe may have succumbed to the cold hands of mortality; however, he lives on. His works are indelible, they outlive him. Achebe has gone to the land of the mortals but his works forever immortalise him. You live in our hearts. Adieu ‘Eagle on the Iroko’.

     

    • Vincent Adodo, Esq.

    Legal Aid Council Ilorin, Kwara State.

  • Nigeria’s telecom glory in Barcelona

    Last month, from February 25-28, the whole of the global mobile telecommunications community, to wit, operators, techies, equipment manufacturers, enthusiasts, regulators and investors emptied into the historical city of Catalonia in Barcelona, Spain. The event was the 2013 edition of the Mobile World Congress (also known as GSMA 2013). It is the Holy Grail of telecommunications as it pertains to mobile market. About 1,700 companies, over 72,000 people from 200 countries attended the event, the highest attendance ever, according to the organisers.

    The yearly event is itself a demonstration of the global acceptance of the mobile genre of telecom service. Besides, the congress offered opportunity to both emerging markets and the developed markets to share ideas, compare notes and build synergies towards the enhancement of the global mobile value chain. Nigeria was at the event. The nation’s telecom regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) made a strong showing at the global summit. This is to be expected. In matters of mobile telecom, Nigeria ranks among the global top ten in growth and market size. For five years in a row, Nigeria was the fastest growing mobile market in the world, a record it still shares with no one.

    It follows, therefore, that in a global meeting of who is who in mobile telecom, Africa’s largest market should not be a passive participant. Dr. Eugene Juwah, the spunky engineer and head of the nation’s regulatory commission who has manifested a tendency to restore sanity in the sector seized the moment. At a session tagged: The Broader Way 2013 Forum – Make it Possible, organized by China’s communications equipment manufacturer, Huawei, Juwah unveiled the limitless milieu of possibilities in the nation’s telecom sector.

    He took the cosmopolitan audience made up of equipment manufacturers, service providers, investors and an amalgam of enthusiasts through the contours and crucible of Nigeria’s telecom industry. If there was ever anyone in the crowd who was doubtful about the safety of his investment in Nigeria, that doubt quickly dissolved when Juwah gave a granular detail of the efforts of the Nigerian government to guarantee the safety and sustainability of investments in the country. He also graphically illustrated the growth pathway of the early investors in the nation’s telecom market as well as the outlay of incentives available to those who would be willing to board the next flight to invest in Nigeria. Juwah seized the opportunity to pitch Nigeria’s Broadband potentials. The ovation that greeted his submission spoke volume of the connection he made with the audience. It was also manifest that some key players in the global telecom market had a wrong perception of Nigeria as an investment destination. It was, in a sense, a moment of glory for the country as Juwah won many global converts for the nation’s telecom sector.

    No doubt, Nigeria has since the mobile explosion attended many international summits but this year’s mobile world congress was a clincher. Juwah made the most of it by holding strategic meetings with several global brands and organisations, namely the Commonwealth Telecommunication Organisation (CTO) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), on how to strengthen existing synergies with Nigeria. He did not pass off the opportunity to meet with Kamar Abass, managing director, Ericsson and other top management of Global Ericsson. One of the positive outcomes of the meetings was the announcement by the Secretary General of the ITU, Dr. Hamadoun Toure, of the consensus of the global community to make Nigeria a Cyber-security regional hub. The implication of this is that Nigeria would have a cyber-security testing centre. Making Nigeria a regional hub has a direct bearing on the massive investment in submarine fibre cable within the country and offshore. It is also a fitting endorsement of the continent-wide leadership of the country in telecom. Toure, a man who has never hidden his admiration of the progress made by the NCC as a flagship regulator within the ITU family, accentuated Juwah’s submission that now is the best time to invest in Africa, especially in Nigeria.

    For Nigerians at the congress, it was no surprise that the country ranks so high on the market-performance index of the ITU. At home, there is a growing tendency to vilify the NCC and dismiss the sector as under-achieving but the world sees Nigeria differently. The nation’s telecom regulator is ranked among the best in the world and it has in recent years become the most realistic tool to benchmark the regulatory authorities in other emerging markets. Juwah sees these attributes translating to good times for the nation in the coming years. He projects that by 2015 the contribution of the ICT sector to the GDP would have shot up from the present 5.6 percent to between 13 and 15 percent. This is not an overstatement. It is a realistic forecast given the strategic interventions of the NCC and the bouquet of incentives which the Nigerian government has outlined for investors.

    This year’s mobile congress in Barcelona simply served notice to the world that Africa is rising and can no longer be ignored. More gratifying is the global perception that Nigeria ideally defines the African market. Selling Africa, nay Nigeria, to the world is usually a tough job especially in the face of the stereotype that Africa is nothing but a spot on the global map where the most ludicrous and the downright ridiculous coexist; where famine, hunger, crime and corruption stomp the streets and marketplace. Such sordid profiling is worse for Nigeria but telecom has come to add a veneer of gloss to the nation’s grubby image.

    Back home, Juwah has promised to move service delivery in the sector to the next level with the expansion of broadband service and the introduction of mobile number portability. He has rallied the private sector to invest more in infrastructure and network expansion even as he has sharpened the regulatory instincts of the NCC. A mix of this and the enthusiasm he stirred among the global players in Barcelona would precipitate yet another telecom revolution in the country; this time, in data penetration and access. The auguries point to a bright and beautiful telecom future.

  • Still on Alamieyeseigha pardon

    SIR: I write in response to the issues raised by critics of the presidential pardon granted former Bayelsa State Governor, Diepreye Solomon Peter (DSP) Alamieyeseigha and others. While many drilled the issue mostly on sentiments, they failed to see the bigger picture.

    Presidential pardon is a constitutional provision, a prerogative of the President and Governors- in some cases, judicial officers. According to section 175 of the Nigerian Constitution “the President may grant any person concerned with or convicted of any offence created by an Act of the National Assembly a pardon, either free or subject to lawful conditions”.

    Pardon could also be seen in parole (for prisoners), plea bargain (for the accused), and amnesty (for insurgents). These are legal instruments used to either aid prosecution or reward offenders for good behavior. Pardons have been used all over the world as a political tool of unification or assimilation. This can be said of the pardon granted former Biafran warlord, Emeka Ojukwu, as well as other Biafran soldiers decades later. Pardons could also be used as conflict resolution tool through the use of amnesty for militants and being proposed for the Boko Haram sect. Contrary to the fear of critics, it is hardly ever an enabler of bad behavior no matter who grants it. No one commits a crime on a probability that he would be pardoned.

    Critics have condemned the pardon on the premonition that it will encourage others to engage in acts of corruption. This argument is misleading and cannot be proven by fact. An example is the case of former Speaker of the House of Representatives Salisu Buhari who was granted pardon by President Obasanjo after he forged certificates. Going by the reasoning of critics, this should have caused others to act similarly, but the reverse is the case. As a matter of fact, people are even more mindful of such acts. Buhari, I should point out, was later appointed chairman of the Nigerian Education Research and Development Council by President Obasanjo.

    Also adding to the debate was the US State Dept. which expressed concern over the pardon of Alamieyeseigha pointing out the issue of future fight on corruption. The position of the US Government can only be shocking, not to mention hypocritical. Will the US Government buy into the premise that by granting pardon to President Nixon, the US has seen a decline in presidential decency with regards to wiretapping, perjury or obstruction of justice by subsequent presidents? By granting pardon for drugs offence to his younger brother, Roger, has President Bill Clinton encouraged such actions on a broader scale?

    It is okay for citizens to be vigilante on fighting corruption, holding their leaders to account and standard, but to continually prosecute a man for a crime which he has been sentenced is ludicrous amounts to double jeopardy. Critics who condemn the pardon as immoral are failing to see where indeed morality lies. It lies in a justice system that doesn’t seek to condemn but correct; doesn’t destroy or direct; and doesn’t eliminate but elevates second chances.

    One thing is sure, no matter what Alamieyeseigha does now or in the future, the nation will always be reminded of the sad episode that characterized his public service. He will forever contend with his weakness and his actions, but that is for his pondering. He has been tried, he served in prison, he forfeited properties, and his reputation beaten. This pardon doesn’t return his properties, or undo his jail time already spent. It assures him and others to come that our nation is capable of forgiveness upon repentance.

    We need to shift the discussion to the fundamentals of how pardons are handed. And what standards should be met in handing out such. But to castigate the President for this action is missing the point. We need to ask questions of transparency. How the decision was reached, what statutes and government instruments were deployed, are questions deserving of advancement for constitutional gains. But to ask that the pardon be revoked in other not to compromise the fight against corruption creates a conundrum for a nation that seeks to discourage corruption and encourage repentance.

    • Teinye Akobo

    Queen Mary, University of London.

  • Fashola’s thoughts on LG autonomy

    Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State will go down in history as one of the very few public officers in contemporary Nigeria who excels in not just building mortars and bricks but also in farsightedness. Fashola thinks profoundly and has the courage of his convictions. He could have chosen the path of populism by continuing the tradition of making tuition at Lagos State University practically free—without minding if the graduates would ever be employable because of the poor quality of instruction and the awful lack of critical facilities arising out of scarce financial resources —but he opted for the trajectory of sustainable development through a review of tuition fees. When a large army of political actors in the South-west were playing to the gallery by denouncing Chinua Achebe’s There Was A Country, a personal account of the Nigerian civil war, Fashola attended an Achebe event in the United States where he positively reviewed the novelist’s oeuvre, declaring that his (Fashola’s) generation of Nigerians is not held hostage by the error of the past. The governor once again displayed the courage of his convictions when at the 80th birthday anniversary of former Works Minister Femi Okunnu held on February 4, he eloquently argued that the concept of constitutionally guaranteed autonomy for local governments in the country is fundamentally flawed.

    It has become fashionable since 1989 when Sam Orji was removed by the Federal Military Government as chairman of the Enugu Local Government for the media, activist groups and even academics to demand a constitutional provision for LG autonomy. After all, argue the protagonists, there are three tiers of government in Nigeria and the constitution has ensured that states are independent of the central government and vice versa. Indeed, it amounts to extravagant use of language to declare LGs the third tier of government. A federal system everywhere is composed of only two government tiers, namely, the federal government and state governments (which are called provincial governments in Canada and regional governments in Nigeria until 1967). The United Kingdom has a local government system all right, but the country runs a unitary system of government. LGs are more of administrative units than political entities. This is why LGs do not have the judiciary, a vital arm of government. Fashola appropriately calls them development centres.

    It is a supreme irony that socio-political activists who spearhead the campaign for constitutionally provided autonomy for LGs are the very elements campaigning against the inclusion of LGs in the constitution on the ground that it should be the prerogative of states to decide whether to have LGs in their territories and the number as well as the structure, based on peculiarities of the states and their development needs. The present national uniform LG structure, a concomitant of the 1976 LG Reforms carried out by the General Obasanjo military government, is counterproductive. The current structure does not recognize differences between LGs in cities and those in rural communities. Hence, it provides, for instance, for a supervisor of agriculture in Lagos Island Local Government Area which does not have one single farm!

    Much as LGs are in theory development centres, the development quotient in their creation has been abysmal; rather, the overriding consideration has been politics. Lagos has the highest population of all states in Nigeria. Yet, it has a mere 20 constitutionally recognized LGAs, in sharp contrast to Kano, which has 44 LGAs. The reason is not difficult to understand: the last LGs were created by the central government during the Sani Abacha military regime. Abacha, a Kano indigene, made sure that the number of LGs in Kano and Jigawa (which was carved out of Kano in 1996) is about all LGAs in the South-east geopolitical zone combined!

    When it is considered that LGs are allocated huge revenues monthly from the federation account, the political economy of Abacha’s LG creation exercise becomes clearer. To address some of the far-reaching implications of the imbalance in local governments across the country, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, as Lagos governor, created additional 37 LGs in one fell swoop which he called local development centres, bringing the total number of LGAs in the state to 57. In a swift reaction, the Kano State government increased the number of its LGAs astronomically to overwhelm the new number in Lagos. In other words, the nation is in a rat race with itself because of the inclusion of LGAs in the present constitution and the consequent allocation of resources from the federation account. The removal of LGAs from the constitution will end this debilitating brand of politics.

    The 774 constitutionally recognized LGAs are too unwieldy for the nation. They are, at best, cost centres and, at worst, cesspools of graft and duty dereliction. I have been to a number of local government offices in recent years, and for some reason never met the legislators who are called councillors. The councillors go to the office only at month end to collect salary and share whatever remains of public resources with other senior officials. Most Nigerians do not know that every LG has, among other key officers, a secretary to the government, a head of service called head of personnel management and supervisors who are like commissioners or ministers. Each appointee is on a heavy pay and has a retinue of aides. Worse, some states have gone ahead to create local development centres (which are LGs in disguise), and they share the monthly resources from the federation account on an equal basis with constitutionally recognized LGs. Instead of having one chairman in a given LGA, there are now about four. This has great implications for the public treasury. Far from these centres being catalysts or vehicles for development, they are avenues for partisan mobilization and provision of jobs for politicians and hangers on. How long can we continue to toy with the destiny of an otherwise great nation?

    Gov Fashola has provided us all with food for thought as regards the place of local governments in our constitution and our federal nexus. He presents his arguments with so much thoughtfulness and admirable courage. He is a thoroughbred developmentalist, in the mould of South-east Asian modernizers like Mahathir Mohammed of Malaysia and Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore. Developmentalists are, according to new social science theorists, political leaders who genuinely regard the well-being and future of their people as inviolable and place the radical enhancement of the living standards of the citizens above politics and all personal and primordial considerations. With people like Fashola and immediate past Central Bank of Nigeria governor Chukwuma Soludo in Nigerian politics, there is still a ray of hope for our people.

    • Adinuba is head of Discovery Public Affairs Consulting.

  • Dankwambo’s efforts at providing potable water in Gombe

    Dankwambo’s efforts at providing potable water in Gombe

    WATER and the environment are of great importance to mankind. No wonder it is said that water breeds life. For this reason, any effort at achieving the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) without providing water and protecting the environment is a waste.

    The understanding of this, vis-à-vis the urgency of time in meeting the MDGs targets of 2015, explains why the administration of Governor Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo in Gombe State has given attention to both issues since assuming office on May 29, 2011. The administration has, therefore, sunk billion of naira into water and environmental projects that are of world standard.

    As at the time Dankwambo assumed office, only a few could drink from the N8 billion Gombe Regional Water Supply Scheme. But the story is no longer the same as the supply of water has not only been properly addressed, but extended beyond the Gombe metropolis.

    Even in the metropolis, water supply was a serious problem before Dankwambo assumed office. Places, such as Barunde, Bagadaza, Riyal, among others, which suffered water shortage, are now beneficiaries.

    The water expansion scheme, therefore, covers Gadam, Garin Kwami, Bojude,Tappi and Komfulata in Kwami Local Government Area. Work in these areas has reached advanced stage and the perennial water scarcity in the areas will soon be a thing of the past.

    The Commissioner of Water Resources and the Environment Mallam Idris Mahdi said the Dankwambo administration embarked on various projects to ensure that all parts of the state are covered by water supply, latest in 2014. This, no doubt, will be timely, as the dateline for the attainment of MDGs is 2015.

    “We have the Gombe North water scheme extension and rehabilitation, which comprises extending water to the suburbs of Gombe.

    “Prior to the coming of the Dankwambo administration, not more than a third of Gombe was covered by water scheme. So, there was need for places that were entitled to get water but not connected to water supply in Gombe water supply to be connected, though we call it Gombe North Water Scheme.

    “The areas include BCGA, Bogo, Nasarawo, Malam Inna, London Maidorowa, Bagadaza, Riyal, Tumfure, which were not connected to a water scheme.

    “But the new water scheme, that is the rehabilitation and expansion of Gombe water scheme, which came on stream in 2012, covers these areas. It is extended to other places outside Gombe, such as Kwami, Gadam, Tapi and Bojude towns and environs of Kwami Local Government Area of the state,” he said.

    Apart from that project, the government, in this year’s budget, plans to begin the expansion of the water treatment plant at Gombe North. It will spend about N1.3 billion on it. The project will be an extension of water from Tumfure to the airport.

    Thus, for the first time, residents of Tumfure and all the settlements along the route to the airport will have potable water.

    A place known for its notorious water scarcity is Dukku with its environs.

    The Dankwambo administration finished the documentation last year for the Dukku Water Scheme and the project will begin soon. The water source from Gombe Abba will be utilised, with a mini-plant, pumping facility and a reservoir for the distribution of water to Dukku and its environs.

    In Nafada Local Government Area, the infiltration gallery is being maintained by the government for steady supply of water in the town and its environs.

    Though there is no big water scheme in Funakaye Local GovernmentArea, many hand pumps, solar-powered boreholes and manual boreholes have been drilled in towns and villages of the council to ensure constant water supply.

    It would sound ironical that many towns and villages in Yamaltu Deba Local Government Area are facing problems of water supply, despite their location in the same area with Dadin Kowa Dam, the source of Gombe Greater Water Supply.

    There are, therefore, plans by the government to provide towns and villages in the area, such as Shinga, Wade, Kinafa, Gwani, Lubo and other settlements, with potable water to address the problem.

    Similarly, as part of efforts to address water scarcity in the Southern part of the state, the government has initiated the Gombe South Regional Water Scheme, which will have its source from the Balanga Dam in Balanga Local Government Area.

    The project is envisaged to draw water from Balanga Dam; it will cover Balanga, Billiri, Kaltungo, Shongom local governments and parts of Akko.

    Though still at consultancy and documentation stage, the project is expected to gulp about N18 billion. By the time it is completed, communities in Gombe South and part of Akko Local Government Area will no longer experience water scarcity. Farmers will also use the facilities to irrigate their farms, as the area has an estimated capacity of 172 million cubic metres of water.

    Other values to be derived from the dam include generation of a mini power project, estimated at 1.5 megawatts, to power the water supply scheme and surrounding villages, irrigation and fishing projects.

    Before the execution of the Gombe South regional water scheme, the government felt that, as a matter of urgency and as temporary solution, water should be supplied to Tula, a historic community with water problems.

    In fact, for several years, the community, with a large population, had relied on one borehole which was provided through communal effort.

    Therefore, to fulfil its campaign promises, the Dankwambo administration has embarked on the Tula interim water supply project, where six boreholes were drilled to solve the age-long water problem in the area pending the execution of Gombe South water scheme.

    Pleased with the availability of water in the town during the drilling of the six boreholes, Governor Dankwambo directed that additional three boreholes be drilled in the town.

    The governor’s strong desire to diversify the income base, especially with regards to agriculture, gave impetus to the ‘desilting’ of the 42 kilometres of irrigation trench constructed along with the multipurpose dam. At the moment, about 24 kilometres is already ‘desilted’ and being put to use by farmers in the area.

    The state Water Board as well the State Water and Sanitation Agency have been active in drilling boreholes and hand pumps, water schemes where greater water schemes do not reach the residents. This complementary effort can be seen in several towns and villages across the state.

    Another area in which the present administration has made tremendous impact is tree planting. This is to mitigate the effects of desert encroachment. The government has embarked on massive planting of trees seedlings for free distribution to interested individuals, organisations and non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

    “Last year, over one million seedlings were distributed and our main objectives is to have the trees planted because they cannot be used for any other purpose,” Mahdi said.

    Besides distribution of seedlings, the government has been also been at the forefront of cultivating trees by planting them along the roadsides and other public places. But the bigger demonstration is the creation of woodlots across the state. So far, six woodlots spread across 30 hectares have been developed and arrangements have been concluded to continue in subsequent rainy seasons.

    To sustain the trend, government is embarking on aggressive tree planting campaigns while systematically fashioning punitive measures against those directly or indirectly involved in flagrant deforestation, especially in prohibited areas.

    For instance, a village head was recently deposed for selling off a government-owned forest reserve located in his domain on the Gombe-Bauchi highway. The forest was retrieved from the buyer without any compensation. This is to underscore the importance of afforestation in the state.

    Battling with the problem of deforestation on one hand, the Gombe State Government, despite its lean resources, is tackling erosion and flooding on the other hand. It is true that no life ought to be lost due to certain action or inaction of man. But the four residents, livestock, arable lands and farms lost in last year’s flood in the state are minimal compared to the 17 deaths and other losses recorded during the August 20, 2004 flooding in the state.

    This is due to the proactive steps taken by the Dankwambo-led administration before the rains set in. The government plans to spend over N500million on erosion control project.

    Presently, proper channeling and redirection of flood has gulped huge sums of money.

    Before these projects, the government had embarked on clearing of drains and waterways in parts of the Gombe metropolis. This has become a continuous exercise; it has been observed that blocked waterways accounted for the unfortunate incidents in the past, even as it is in tandem with the saying that “cleanliness is next to godliness”.

    As an experiment, 400 plastic waste bins were initially provided for sanitation in Gombe township. But due to the challenges the residents faced, the bins are being changed to bigger metal incinerators to avoid being stolen, rundown by vehicles or burnt through careless deposition of fire into them.

    Four heavy duty waste disposal vehicles and a number of tractors were procured to dispose off the waste bins on a daily basis. Also, a firm has been contracted to daily clean the major roads and streets as well as the drains, even as the Gombe State Environmental Protection Agency (GOSEPA) is being reorganised to make it more proficient and effective in handling its responsibilities.

    Gombe is practically the least on the Federation Account’s chart and one of those generating the poorest internal revenue. Therefore, to imagine that this giant stride is made in barely two years amidst other urgent competing demands is awesome. No wonder the Speaker House of Representatives, Alhaji Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, during a recent visit to the state, praised Governor Dankwambo for the giant strides his administration has made in all sectors, despite the fact that the state gets one of the smallest federal allocations.

    The government, has no doubt, proved that it is determined to solve one of the nagging problems of the state – water scarcity – as can be seen from the various projects it has been executing.

    • Dahiru writes from Gombe

  • Open letter to Chime

    A statesman recuperating from a debilitating ailment hardly needs any unnecessary distractions let alone one that could snowball into a conflagration, an uncontrollable combustion enough to trigger of an internecine hostility nay war.

    Permit me, Your Excellency to have taken this thorny and sensitive issue to the public domain, but this is possibly the fastest means of communication, considering the urgency it deserves and more so, your gubernatorial authority and dispatch can only nip in the bud this injustice.

    A vibrant town called Umualo, landlocked but strategic in Isi-Uzo Local Government Area, has for long endured the provocation and overt display of intrigues by its neighboring town,Amankanu, of Nkanu East Local Government.

    About three decades ago, the farmlands and settlements of Umuezuboke Village that border Amanakanu people, became the centre of a communal war when the latter forcefully encroached on Umualo lands to usurp them. The Amankanus were repelled, thus suffering a bloody nose.

    Only last week, 31 years after, another surreptitious attempt was re-enacted. This time, with an alleged tacit government support of the Ministry of Lands in Enugu State. A surveyor emerged on the lands again with some Amankanu people and illegally began demarcation encompassing farmlands of Umuezuboke, their schools and the natives who had resided there since the days of Methuselah.

    Of course, the natives rushed out and seized the implements, chasing away the surveyor and his collaborators. How lucky they were. Our people, who have the greatest respect for the governor, have always remained peaceful, a hallmark of Isi-Uzo people in general. In other very hostile climes, the intruders would have disappeared from mother earth.

    Before this ugly incident, the news had been rife that the Amankanu people would be giving their land to government for various developmental projects. What a lofty news, but would they be consigning parcels of land they don’t own to government. Are they Umuezuboke people who own and had lived there ever since the ancient days? No one toys with his ancestral land.

    Umualo cannot be an impediment to development. It is most welcome but if government should be keen on the area, it is only proper and just that the genuine people who own the land are consulted directly because it is an autonomous community and not answerable to interlopers.

    Let’s humour the commissioner for Lands and give him the benefit of doubt that he is ignorant that the proposed ‘Greek gift’, by the Amankanus are parcel of lands of Umuezuboke people of Umualo Town viz Igbogobe, Ikagwu, Egerum and Odobido amongst others. The alarming permutations have call for your immediate action, more so when it is feared that the commissioner coming from Nkanuland is out to railroad a long-forgotten dispute in favour of Amankanu.

    This writer cannot forget in a hurry the wisdom you displayed in settling amicably a hot bed of 23 chairmanship candidates vying relentlessly to become the flag bearer of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the last elections in Enugu State. So patient, so fatherly with firmness and fair play, you devised a methodology that eventually produced the PDP candidate after four-gruelling hours you gave to Isi-Uzo.

    Even when it was obvious other local governments lay in wait to have audience, you said inter alia: “I have all the time for Isi-Uzo people by so doing demonstrated a heart pure, untainted and love for my people.” You won my admiration that sunny day at the Enugu Government Lodge.

    It is on the strength and realising how decisive you resolved the burning issues of that time, that this letter becomes imperative to be channelled to you, to call the commissioner and his ilk to order.

    The Isi-Uzo people remain eternally grateful to you for doing the road from Enugu- Ugwogo-Ikem, making it easier for our people to get to the capital city. Some of us were born into seeing no such road since in the 50s. Although Umualo still awaits your promise of doing their road less than eight kilometres off the major Ugwogo-Neke-Ikem road, the community has borne the brunt of being the only community in Isi-Uzo without electricity, without a GSM service provider, it would be a telling blow if their ancestral lands would now be usurped through tyranny.

    This has fuelled the suspicion of our people that they have been wrongly lumped into Enugu East as yeomen instead of Nsukka which is their ancestral home and some of us who are unrepentant Nsukka people believe that the contraption was unjust and like a popular cart pusher plying the ever busy Ogbete market in Enugu with bold inscriptions on the body of his ‘car’ “Agaracha must return.”

    Our people must return to their kith and kin, it’s just time, just time!

    A good laugh, Mr. Governor.

    By Obinwa Nnaji

  • Lokoja and the centenary celebration

    The present administration has deemed it wise to celebrate Nigeria’s attainment of its 100th year of its amalgamation which it promised would be private partnership driven.

    The move by the federal government must be applauded in context of holistic approach of making less money spinning venture, where scarce resources are been spent for selfish creeds.

    When President Goodluck Jonathan was canvassing for votes in 2011 at a political rally in Lokoja, Kogi State he promised the people that Lokoja would play a greater role in Nigeria’s centenary celebration, by giving her special role considering the importance of the town to the country’s historical development.

    We would like to appeal to federal government to consider the building of the centenary city in the ancient town of Lokoja to accord her this important role, in fulfilment of the president’s promise.

    The decision to build the centenary city in Abuja is untenable, wasteful and unnecessary. Building it in Lokoja would go a long way to attract many would be visitors that would come into the country to see other parts of the country that played different roles in uniting this country.

    The many historical monuments in the ancient town of Lokoja would be added show piece to the centenary celebration, many would-be tourists would believe in our historical heritage when they criss-cross all the nooks and crannies of the country.

    We hope the federal government would see to the building of the centenary city in Lokoja for the overall success of the celebration.

    Bala Nayashi

    Lokoja, Kogi State.