Between Katsina politicians and 2011 polls
A case that immediately comes to my mind is the case of Katsina State where Barrister Ibrahim Shehu Shema is the state governor while some three or four personalities from the same state and members of the same political party who have recently and severally been referred to in the nation’s dailies as “Abuja boys” […]
A case that immediately comes to my mind is the case of Katsina State where Barrister Ibrahim Shehu Shema is the state governor while some three or four personalities from the same state and members of the same political party who have recently and severally been referred to in the nation’s dailies as “Abuja boys” are plotting against him in order to snatch power.
Apart from my reading the various constraints this gentleman Shema is facing from these people, I contacted a friend of mine, a civil servant in Katsina State with whom I attended the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria in the mid-eighties so that I can see and know what a bad man Shema is to deserve what the so called Abuja boys are doing to him.
The first question my friend asked me was if I have also read any support to the Abuja boys from the people of the state, and my answer was in the negative. This kick-started long daily conversations between me and my friends that by now I feel very competent to comment on the situation in Katsina so that other states and perhaps the nation can take and apply in their respective situations.
First, I know that Barr. Shema only came into the Katsina political fold in 1999 when he was appointed the Attorney-General and Commissioner of Justice of the state where he started making impact by computerising his ministry and made his staff more committed to the state’s civil service in order to serve their people better.
Shema did not however return as commissioner in the second term of the state administration then but was promoted to serve the nation at various capacities at the national level only to return to the state to favourably and successfully compete for governorship alongside other candidates in the state and defeated them to become the present governor of the state in 2007.
Also while going through the nation’s dailies, one can see that the governor does not believe in propaganda or fighting others on the pages of newspapers, since while all these hullabaloos are going on against him, he concentrated in bringing dividends of democracy to his people.
The governor has so far no doubt impacted positively in all sectors of the state from the improvement of worker’s welfare, healthcare, provision of good potable water to many more communities, beautiful and standard roads network cutting across several villages, many of which he has also electrified, development in the agricultural sector through the improvement of dams, fertilizer sales and farming activities in the rainy and dry season as well as transforming the youth who were turning into thugs and becoming a threat to their communities for lack of what to do, to more useful and productive citizens by establishing a Craft Village that now engages the youth that are receiving trainings in important trades and also making their economic contributions to the state.
Governor Shema has continued to enjoy the goodwill of the people of the state who, as the direct beneficiaries of his good works, are yearning for him to continue as governor and keep the flag flying for them. Apart from the calls made by individuals, high and low, for the governor to continue beyond 2011, only recently, his party’s chairmen at the local governments level along with their officials met at a meeting in Katsina and unanimously endorsed him for second term while two weeks after that, the council chairmen of all the 34 local government areas led by the chairman of the state’s chapter of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), Alhaji Haruna Jani rose from a meeting where the body commended the laudable achievements of the governor and endorsed him for second term.
If looked at closely therefore, this situation is applicable to many states of the federation and so Nigerians can apply it in their separate respective situations so that we can continue to have the best and selfless rather than bad and selfish leaders in place as we open another page in our collective political growth in 2011.
Karube writes from Mafoni ward, Maiduguri