The celebration of this year’s Independence Day anniversary may have been low keyed, but it is certainly not the same in terms of score card. This is because, apart from the usual elaborate fanfare, an independence anniversary is a time for sober reflection from the leader and the people.
An anniversary period is a time when the leader reviews his activities to see if he is on course, if his activities are in line with his promises and, above all, see how positively he has impacted on the lives of the people. The people, on the other hand, see it as a period they examine the level of commitment to the responsibility of the leadership to the led in terms of delivering the goods.
In Gombe State, it is no longer news or a big deal how the Independence anniversary days are celebrated. Instead, all that the people look up to is how they have fared under their leaders. And under the leadership of Alhaji Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo, Gombe State has been counting its blessings since May 29, last year, till date with horde of infrastructural and human capacity development projects to show for it in their numbers.
As I write, the Gombe State Government, under the administration of Dankwambo, has awarded over 50 roads for construction across the state. The roads, worth billions of Naira, run into several hundreds of kilometres with several completed and many others at different stages of completion.
One of the landmark projects in this direction is the hitherto abandoned 54-kilometre Kanawa–Jagali–Deba–Jauro Gotel Road with a spur to Kuri in order to open up the international grains market there and the nearby communities.
In the light of the understanding that water is life, Governor Dankwambo has taken the jinx-breaking Gombe Regional Water Supply Scheme to a higher level by extending it further from Gombe town to Bojude and Kwami communities and the environs in Kwami Local Government Area. Water supply in the state capital is being properly reticulated to new layouts.
But that is not all about water. An even bigger water project in mass and coverage than what we have in Gombe is springing up in Gombe South. Tagged Gombe South Regional Water Supply Scheme due to its location, the project when completed will take care of the water needs of Balanga, Kaltungo, Shongom, Billiri and Akko local government areas.
The northern part of the state is equally adequately covered with water works under construction at Dukku and Nafada Local Government Areas to end the thirst for water by the areas and other parts of the state.
The governor, in his foresight, understands that all the places cannot be covered, despite the gigantic nature of the waterworks. To ensure that none is being left out, therefore, about 50 solar-powered boreholes are at presently being sunk at different locations across the state and they are all at various stages of completion.
On Thursday, September 27, Governor Dankwambo constituted a committee to look into the modalities for establishing a state polytechnic, which has been sited at Bajoga, the headquarters of Funakaye Local Government Area, in the northern part of the state.
This development is coming on the heels of the establishment of state College of Education at Billiri, Gombe South, where work has already begun. But prior to the establishment of both tertiary institutions is the establishment of the School of Remedial Studies at Kumo, headquarters of Akko Local Government Area.
The school, which is an extension of Gombe State University, is designed to admit 1,500 students per session. It remediates both junior and senior secondary school pupils. It also has the capacity to train people on trades or sports, if they are not interested in further pursuing their academics after completing their remedial programmes.
The secondary and primary levels are not left out in the process of breathing quality and standard into the state’s educational system.
Thus, model schools (15 primary and 15 secondary) are being created from existing ones while many others are undergoing massive renovation, reconstruction and expansion, as the case may be. Books, worth hundreds of millions of Naira, were recently procured for distribution to pupils and students across the state.
In agriculture, the Dankwambo administration has turned around the moribund and hitherto abandoned Gombe Poultry Production Unit into a major employer of labour in the journey towards regaining its lost glory. The unit is a major distributor of eggs locally and to parts of neighbouring countries.
Thirty-five new tractors have been procured, in addition to renovating the existing but grounded 35 others to bolster the state’s Tractor Hiring Unit.
Gombe State procured and distributed metric tonnes of assorted fertilisers for distribution to farmers at highly subsidised rates in the current farming season.
Recently, Gombe got 55 transformers under the present administration. The government had distributed 50 transformers to various locations as well as embarked on the electrification of rural communities.
“But of what use would it be to build infrastructure when the people, who are to benefit from them, are not catered for?” This was Governor Dankwambo’s question when he defended the obvious need for capacity development. It did not come as a surprise, therefore, when the administration put in place some skills acquisition centres across the state.
Much earlier, 320 persons graduated from four vocational centres where they learnt seven different trades. They were resettled with tools of their trades and given N200,000 revolving loan each to enable them start their businesses.
The centres, trades and trainees have since been scaled up to broaden participation and ultimately strengthen the economy of the state.
The Gombe State Government, under the present administration, entered into an agreement with the Bank of Industry (BOI) to facilitate the disbursement of jointly funded N1 billion loan to individuals and multipurpose societies in the state. The first N500 million has been disbursed and 74 groups and individuals have benefitted.
In the area of security, the governor has successfully clamped down on the Kalare phenomenon. He disbanded the group during his inaugural address and followed it up with the arresting anyone found in the act.
But upon realising that the Kalare is beyond hooliganism and has become a means of livelihood, as it were, the Dankwambo administration set up the ‘Talba Youths Rehabilitation and Orientation Programme’ under which 1,997 youths were rehabilitated and trained into Ward, Traffic and Environmental Marshals. These youths have helped in effectively complementing the efforts of relevant bodies.
The list is endless and the independence anniversary celebration was a happy one for the people of Gombe State, who are grateful to God for delivering the state into the care Alhaji Dankwambo and for all the governor has done for them in last 16 months. “It’s a brief period of time, but it is full of harvest. Only God knows how developed Gombe would be in 2015,” said an analyst on the activities of the Gombe State Government.
“There is a lot to do. And we will continue to do our best to put smiles on the faces of the people. But we wish there is more fund available to us to enable ,us do the much we wish,” Dankwambo said at a recent public function. Suffice it to say it is a period of brilliant performance and enviable scorecard
•Ismail wrote from Bolari Quarters in Gombe.
