Alhaji Liman Ciroma: The grit, grace and the charm
Alhaji Liman Ciroma was the first highest-ranking northern Muslim public servant that I personally got to meet formally. I would later develop a very respectful relationship with this most exceptional, calm, gracious gentleman and patriot. But let me provide some context to my meeting with him. I met him through the instrumentality of the late […]
Alhaji Liman Ciroma was the first highest-ranking northern Muslim public servant that I personally got to meet formally. I would later develop a very respectful relationship with this most exceptional, calm, gracious gentleman and patriot. But let me provide some context to my meeting with him. I met him through the instrumentality of the late Fr. Liam Burke, an Irish Catholic missionary who spent over fifty years working in the Archdiocese of Kaduna. He came to Nigeria in 1952 after his ordination, left the country in 1996 and died in 2013.
I had just been ordained a Priest in 1977 and was posted to St. Andrew’s Catholic Church, in the industrial layout of Kakuri. I was the only indigenous Priest in Kaduna metropolis then and it was a bit lonely for me. However, Fr. Burke who lived adjacent to St. Anne’s School in Kakuri, was such a good neighbour. He became very fond of me, often inviting me to his house for meals and tea. He had an incredible memory. Dates, names, faces, events, and so on, were always at his fingertips.
At that time, everything in the Archdiocese of Kaduna literally revolved around Fr. Burke, having been appointed the pioneer Secretary of the Diocese from its inception in 1952. His social reach was incredible. Well before talk of dialogue between Muslims and Christians, Fr. Burke was already mixing very well with the high and mighty in Kaduna metropolis. He had been at the foundation of almost every institution in the Diocese, St. Gerard’s Hospital, St. John’s College, St. Anne’s, Sacred Heart College and Primary School among many others. He spoke so much to me about his Muslim friends and how I needed to know them.
The name of Liman Ciroma was frequent on his lips. One day he said to me: “I must introduce you to Alhaji Liman Ciroma. He is a very good man and you will like him. He is also very open and knowledgeable. He is one of my best friends.” Finally, the day came. We drove in his car to see Alhaji Ciroma. My heart was beating because I really had no idea how this meeting would be nor could I fathom what this man would look like.
As I drove to Fr. Burke’s house, I was wondering what I would say to this man if I met him. I got there and found that he had already arrived and both he and Fr. Burke were already drinking tea and chatting. To my greatest shock, as I entered the room, Alhaji Ciroma, in a simple, but resplendent white agbada stood up to greet me. I didn’t know whether to kneel or if I had bent well enough. He reached out his hand with a simple, clear and honest smile that came from the heart and said to me as he stretched out his hand – “Fr. Burke has told me a lot about you.” Despite my being a relatively small boy, he being old enough to be a father, Alhaji Ciroma spoke to me very affectionately. Despite my seeming unease which I tried to hide, he put diplomacy aside and talked to me as if we had known one another for long. It was a brief but memorable meeting. His candescence, simplicity and charm caught my attention.
As we departed, he shook my hand warmly again and said: “You must come to my house. I nodded shyly as he said: Have you ever eaten brabusko? No, I said, shyly, I have never heard of such food.” He tilted his head, smiled broadly, forgave my brabusko ignorance and as if feeling sorry and anxious to make up, went on: “My wife makes very good brabusko. You must come.” He gave me a description of his modest house which, as it turned out, was not far from my Archbishop’s house.
My relationship with Alhaji Ciroma would go beyond just a meal of brabusko, which I honoured. I did visit his house and his wife gave me a very warm welcome and reception and yes, I did eat my brabusko. I left Kaduna less than one year after our meeting and we had no further contact. I returned to Kaduna in 1982. I had grown up and my level of confidence had improved. I sought him out and we resumed a mutual relationship that was like one between father and son, or most senior brother and a little brother. His charm and simplicity were always his trademark by which I marked him.
In 1992, when I published my Ph.D thesis under the title, ‘Religion, Politics and Power in Northern Nigeria’, I began to plan a formal launch. My publisher, the indefatigable and ageless Chief Joop Berkhout, then of CEO of Spectrum Books and I began to plan the event. I knew that the book would generate a lot of controversy not because of any major errors but largely because most people would be reading some of the findings for the first time.
The respected scholar and my friend, Professor Attahiru Jega had already agreed to review the book while my other good friend of blessed memory, Alhaji Dankabo of Kabo Airlines accepted to be the Chief Presenter of the book. In searching for a Chairman, I told Chief Berkhout that I could think of no one else but Alhaji Ciroma. “He is my Chairman,” Chief Berkhout said to me with excitement. When I told Alhaji Ciroma about the book and took a copy to him, he was visibly happy and accepted to chair the event.
The details of the book launch, and the fireworks that followed, did not disappoint. The drama in one of the halls of Durbar Hotel, Kaduna, that day was something to behold. In the end, though, all ended well, but the hornet’s nest had been stirred much to my own delight.
Alhaji Ciroma remained for me a quintessential gentleman, a great patriot, statesman, technocrat and bureaucrat who shaped the public service in Nigeria. He was a man of grace and finesse, a very decent human being who deserves a very special place in the annals of our nation’s records of public service. Although remembered for his services as the Secretary of the Federal Government, his greatest legacy for me perhaps lies in his pioneering role as the first Nigerian graduate of Archeology and the one who laid the foundation for the National Museum, one of our key institutions that have fallen victim to our nation’s culture of institutional decay.
I am sadly unable to be at Arewa House this morning as distinguished Nigerians gather to pay tribute to a great man, much to my regret. I recall his role in the building of this very edifice. I wish to end my tribute by thanking Mama for my brabusko. If Mama is still strong enough, I am still available for another round of brabusko. God rest a really great man.
Kukah is the bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Sokoto