In this interview with some senior journalists, Nasarawa State governor, Abdullahi Sule, speaks about development strides in his state, and why he places a high premium on the development of the solid mineral sector, Onyedi Ojiabor was there.
What are you doing to encourage solid mineral development in Nasarawa State?
We are always not shy in trying to take a position. I think you need to go to the background of how it even started in the first place. I was the Group Managing Director of Dangote Refinery.
While I was in Lagos, I had the opportunity, actually, of being informed or being invited to come and run for the Office of the governor. At the initial stage, I was a little bit, you know, uncomfortable being invited because I didn’t trust politicians, and I didn’t want to be invited only for them to eat my money and send me away, so I was worried. But when we finally made the decision that, yes, I was going to take the challenge, one of the things we did was to invite my good friend, Kunle Elebute, from KPNG, to come in and carry out a comprehensive survey and a study of Nasarawa State, because I will not claim that I knew Nasarawa State that much.
After going to school outside Nasarawa State, studying in the U.S., working in the U.S., coming back to Nigeria, working in Lagos, I didn’t live much in Nasarawa State to know the state that well.
Elebute and his team spent six months carrying out a very comprehensive survey. One of the things they mentioned was that Nasarawa was one of the richest states in the federation with great potential.
And they mentioned to me the area that I know very well, oil and gas. They said there is the presence of hydrocarbons in Nasarawa State, and yet nothing was done. And they also mentioned solid metals, precious metals, and agriculture.
I became more and more excited. So this is just a little background for you to know that we didn’t go into it by accident, it was as a result of the study.
I’m happy that you went to that site, because like you mentioned, you know, the marble in that site, you have seen, you would have been more excited if you had gone to the site of our lithium processing plant, because evidently from the discussions, you did not go there. Now, those are all some of the issues that came up. You know, there is also a tin operation. I didn’t hear that you went to that place. These solid minerals factories are being duplicated across the state. More companies are coming in to invest in the solid minerals sector right now.
We pride ourselves as the state housing the biggest lithium processing plant in the country. But in reality, there is one coming that is bigger than that in the same Nasarawa State, so those are the kinds of things that are happening.
We have also invested heavily in agriculture. I would have been happier if you had at least visited our farm, you know, of agriculture. Abdullahi Adamu, our first executive governor, has a farm of about 3,000 hectares of land. We have 10,000 hectares of land belonging to the state government. We have already started harvesting rice. It would have been exciting if you had visited that. We have not even signed any MoU with any buyer; instead, we are focused on harvesting the rice. We are keeping it in the warehouse, then form a pyramid of rice here and then make the noise. My background from the private sector is to make less noise and more productivity so that people will see our actions rather than our talking.
How do you intend to ensure the sustainability of the Nasarawa State Vocational and Technology Center Lafia?
I’m very interested more in skill acquisition. Everything that we do in Nasarawa State comes from our vision for the state. My parents couldn’t afford to send me to school in America. So for that reason, I went on a scholarship. When I arrived in the United States on scholarship in 1980, by 1982, Plateau State was already having challenges with the MPN Center, so we were not getting our scholarship.
But I went to technical school. I did welding. Some of my schoolmates in the university, who were not getting their scholarships, had to abandon their school. But because I did welding, I got to Alcoa and got a job as a welder. So I went to school. I didn’t skip school for one day. I was going to school in the morning. I was doing welding in the night, you know, at Alcoa. It’s because I had skill. That is my number one motivation.
My second motivation was when we in Dangote decided to construct the refinery you see today at Epe Lagos. When the whole programme started, with the silos, with the distillation unit, with some of the most sophisticated and expensive equipment that were there, the equipment manufacturers insisted that they needed skilled and certified technicians. We needed to go to India. We couldn’t get some in Nigeria.
Dangote imported 4,000 technicians, 4,000 from India. We were the only ones qualified and deployed because nobody would have that kind of installation unit and allow a roadside mechanic without certification to do it. So that’s the second motivation for me. This was the reason I said that if I became the governor of Nasarawa State, we would produce skilled Nasarawa State citizens, who would be employed whenever another Dangote was looking for 4000 skilled artisans. At least we can say we in Nasarawa State have 500 technicians, go and look for the other 3500 elsewhere. This is the motivation. This is the dream. And we have a lot of people that graduated with all kinds of degrees, no skill. This is the skill for them.
When I was the Managing Director of African Petroleum, one of the things that we saw was that employees with Secondary School certificates didn’t know what to do with the N15 million or N20 million given to them upon retirement because they lacked the skills.
So now in Nasarawa State, we have pre-retirement skill acquisition so that when people are retiring, at least they get their money and they have the skill to go and set up a welding shop, a fabrication shop, a carpentry shop, an agricultural mechanization shop, something, you know, that they can do. Because when they remain idle, some people will take the money, get a second or third or fourth wife, and then get into more trouble, more children, and that’s the end of the money. But if he’s taking the money based on the skill that he has, then he becomes more useful in post-retirement. So we are doing it for youth, and we are doing it also for the elderly.
Is there more you intend to do for women and youth empowerment?
Of course, we do. We are going to continue to do a lot. The Vice President was here to launch for the first time in the country the Gender Document of our administration. It all has to do with women. It’s part of the Human Capital Development Agency, of which the Deputy Governor is the chairman. So all these are geared towards helping women.
Nasarawa State is a pacesetter when it comes to women taking the lead in leadership and careers. For the first time, a woman is the Chief Justice of Nasarawa State, for the first time, we have a woman as Vice Chancellor of the University. This is part of my administration’s vision to empower women, and the reason is that I have some very important women who came very close and played some key roles in my life, and I have seen that.
And one of those is Ndi Okereke, former Director-General of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE). I think since she left, something happened to the Nigerian Stock Exchange. And it’s because of the charisma she brought into the job, the honesty. So I have so much respect for women professionals. When we had our investment summit, it was early in the morning, and Amina Mohammed, of the United Nations, woke up very early and participated virtually. During the last United Nations General Assembly in New York, I had to walk up to her to thank her but she said she would do anything for Nasarawa, because she believes we are one of the most serious states. So, of course, we are doing everything for women. And the more women that come, the more women we will continue to give opportunities to.
What motivates you to focus on the provision of rural infrastructure across the state?
I’m a rural dweller. I’m sure they will show you my village. I come from a village. And so I grew up in a village. I understand village life. But to be honest with you, one of the most important things is that the wealth of Nasarawa State is in the villages. The wealth is not in the cities. The farming areas are in the villages. The minerals that we are talking about are in the villages. So the activities that are actually going to bring out wealth in Nasarawa State are in the villages. So one of the things you must do is you must empower the villages to belong, to feel a sense of belonging. Our administration is that of inclusivity.
We don’t want anybody to be left out. Whether youth, women, or the elderly, everybody is carried along. That’s why we are doing the training, the skill acquisition for young people who just graduated from school, and we are doing it also for those who are retiring because we want the entire value chain to be incorporated.
I wish you had been to Farin Ruwa, a purely agricultural area. There we have a dam that has the capacity to generate power. But there was no road to the area. So we had to actually build a road. We had to construct a full-fledged asphalt road, to bring up all the potentials in the area. So the wealth is actually in our rural areas.
How do you want to be remembered as the fourth executive governor of the state?
Well, I want them to remember me as somebody who truly believes in the state. Someone who has come into the state with all sense of humility, honesty, prudent management of their resources, leader by example, and somebody who came in to bring out all the prospects of the state and convert those prospects to wealth for the benefit of the good people of Nasarawa State.
So that’s how I want them to remember me, as someone who believes that we should set up the structures for the development of the state, from the civil service to the public service, all the way to our rural areas; a leader that wants everybody to feel some sense of belonging.
Where do you get the funding for all these infrastructural projects across the state, given that Nasarawa is among those getting the least allocation from the government?
We are among the states getting the least allocation from the federal government. But that doesn’t make us the poorest state. We are one of the states with the greatest potential in human and capital resources. We have mineral resources, oil and gas. I wish you had also gone to Obi Local Government Area where oil drilling is currently taking place. Our state is among only three states where oil exploration is taking place. For this reason, Nasarawa State can’t be poor.
We are not borrowing money in Nasarawa State to execute projects. Since I came in, we have not gone to the bank to borrow money. It’s the mentality I have from the private sector that we should not go borrowing. I decided to block all the loopholes that we have. There is a lot of money in Nasarawa State, especially in revenue, but there are also many leakages. Our aim is to block leakages, but we still have a long way to go in terms of revenue generation for the state.
We also look at some other sources of revenue. One of them is the advantage we have bordering the FCT. So you will see a lot of projects motivated by our proximity to the capital, especially, as it relates to housing. They are all targeted to rich people living in the FCT to come to Nasarawa. That is one of the things that we are doing.
When we came in 2019, our Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) was N7.7 billion, but today it is over N20 billion annually. We also generate between N1.3 to N1.7 billion monthly.
We have also gone to the federal government to see how we can access more revenue aside from our statutory allocation. Every time there is one grant or so from the World Bank or IMF, Nasarawa State is there. That is why we are number one in the first disbursement of NGCares. We got more money in the second disbursement than we got in the first disbursement. So if you look at all the various interventions from the World Bank, Nasarawa State is there.
Most of these rural roads that you see today are being done from the money sourced externally. That’s how we are getting a lot of the resources that are going into health, education, and so on.
What is your administration doing in terms of investment in Housing, and why has it become difficult to move roadside traders and bus drivers to the market and approved parks?
The media is holding me back because the moment you take certain actions, people will say, ‘Oh, Nasarawa State governor is heartless. Oh, Nasarawa State governor is that. Oh, there is no job in the country, and the people who are just doing their business by the roadside, the governor has arrested them.’ But we are currently doing a lot on this highway. We have been clearing the illegal traders and motor parks along the road. But you clear them today, they come back tomorrow.
Other options we are looking at currently include tolling the road and constructing a rail line that can connect Keffi to Apo. One of the reasons why I went to China recently was to explore the possibility of establishing a toll road or a bridge that will take off from Nyanya to Masaka.
And then it becomes a toll and then we charge it. So all these are wonderful ideas, but wonderful ideas like one of the movies, what Nollywood stars say, they say a wonderful idea without money is no idea at all. And that is what we are looking at.
But on housing, we started doing something. We have developed 200 hectares of land in Masaka into a Housing Peninsula. The houses there are partially completed and prospective buyers are expected to complete it and move in.
There is another housing estate called Technology Village on your way to Gurku. It is called a Race Course. There is also another 200 hectares of land that is being developed. Customs officers took about 100 houses upon commissioning. Another major housing project was the one initiated by my predecessor, Tanko Al-Makura, it is called Gunku Kabusu. The area is connecting Mbappe to Maitama. We are already in the advanced stage with the FCT Minister to provide access roads in the area, because the road will benefit both parties.
We are going to provide sites and services to the 13,000 hectares of land. Ours is to provide the infrastructure, the road, electricity, and water. So prospective investors can pick 1000 hectares, and 500 hectares to build estates similar to what we have in Lagos. But all of these require money to achieve. We as a state have to manage resources in such a way that all sectors are given the needed attention.
Can you tell us what your administration has done in terms of security, pensions, gratuity, teachers’ welfare, and employment of teachers among others?
Security is the backbone of everything, and that’s the reason why we took security head-on, on arrival. The first thing is to ensure that we have security with our neighbors, and then we have security within the state. So, a little over a month after I came in, there were a lot of issues about herder-farmer clashes.
The TIV community is one of the communities that are both in Benue and Nasarawa State, with the Fulanis. Remember the Benue State government enacted a law prohibiting open grazing in the state. This law is not in Nasarawa State, and this gave us lots of problems managing the tensions between farmers and herders. So, the first thing we did when we came on board was to douse the tension between farmers and herders and now our people can go to the farms freely. We have also spent a lot on internal security because we needed a situation where the people would feel free and comfortable. We have also spent a lot on introducing technology to security.
Education is one thing we cannot play around with, so we started with a baseline survey on what needs to be done in the sector. So I set up an independent committee made up of think tanks from the Federal University. I didn’t want a state university because I didn’t want our influence. I became worried about the state of education in the north because anytime they mention the ten worst states in terms of education; the north is always at the forefront. When you mention the ten best states in education, southern states always take the lead.
So, we did a baseline survey to find out our challenges, and we’ve been working on that. We found some challenges including curriculum, infrastructure, quality teachers, and so on.
If we employ 10,000 teachers, I don’t think it’s enough. And then, some of the quality of the schools is another major issue.
I came in and found a polytechnic that was established and yet, none of the accredited courses was technical. The courses we met were Economics, Political Science, International Relations, and so on. I have nothing against those courses, but then, the meaning of polytechnic is multi-technic.
So, we must have multi-technic accreditation. So, today, we are happy that we have at least five technical courses that have accreditation.
And I always give credit to the management that helped us to prepare. Accreditation takes a lot. It takes bringing in quality resources, people, tools, and classes. Our administration has also established some technical institutions including the creation of the Faculty of Engineering in Gudi.
