Constitutional amendment will make North poorer, warns Kwankwaso

After your first tenure, you lost the bid to come back. You launched a very spirited campaign to return and you came back to complete your tenure. What are you doing differently now? Let me use this opportunity to welcome you to the Kano State for Governor’s lodge and also to thank the people of […]

After your first tenure, you lost the bid to come back. You launched a very spirited campaign to return and you came back to complete your tenure. What are you doing differently now?

Let me use this opportunity to welcome you to the Kano State for Governor’s lodge and also to thank the people of Kano state for finding us worthy of re-election to come in and continue the good things started in our first term. I also want to take this opportunity to say that from my own observation after the first eight years after we left office, I personally came to the conclusion that the government came much earlier than its time. And that is why during my government (1999-2003) many people could not see what we were doing in terms of programmes and projects. Unfortunately, at that time we had so many issues on ground, leading to a lot of sentiments, religious sentiments, ethnic, regional and so on.

And unfortunately for us, during the 2003 elections, the Federal Government, of course, through the National Assembly, the governors and the president, created a lot of confusion among the voters.  So, we realised that people didn’t understand what we were doing.  When we were laying interlocks along walkways in Kano, opposition was going to the radio and television that that was not what they needed. And many people believed them. The same government is back now in 2011. We are laying the same type of interlocks that people are appreciating. So, you can see how time is changing.

At that time we purchased 1000 millimetre of tiles and pipe, which were laid from Tamburawa to the city of Kano. People were not appreciating; opponents had gone to the radio and TV and other media to protest.  Now, they are laying pipes, we are laying 600 millimetres of pipes from Bagwai local government through Bichi to Miltara: a total of over 40 kilometres. People are appreciating. We have also purchased another 100 millimetre pipe, people are happy about it, which we are laying in-between Challawa water ways to Goron Dutse overhead tank. That is the same size, 15 kilometers. So, you can see that what we were doing between 1999-2003 which people were not seeing in the actual sense of it and therefore were not appreciating, now similar programmes and projects are going on and people are appreciating.

During our first term we were training women and we were giving them training and free capital of N5,000. They were told that when our opponent gets elected , they would make it so much that after one year they would start  giving out zakkat (poor due) themselves. People believed them. For eight years no woman has been given five kobo. And, in fact, instead of them giving out zakkat, the same women themselves are looking for zakkat themselves because nobody was helping them.

So, you could see how time changes, from the time of our first term to 2011. And I have to say that it wasn’t the level of campaign that did the magic. I believe people had the opportunity to compare and contrast what we did in four years and what the other government did in eight years.  Therefore, it was very easy for us, after making this comparison, for people to make up their mind. And with or without that campaign I am convinced that PDP would still be in power in Kano State.

Kano State is one state that could boast of high Internally Generated Revenue. How has the security problem affected your IGR?

Let me say that from 1999 to 2003 when we were in government, we did not borrow a kobo, either from our local banks or international organisations or even individuals. We were able to manage our government within the limit of the resources.  And we decided to do the same during this our second term.  Of course, when we came in, we had a challenge of inheriting over N77 billion debt, over $200 million debt. But we decided to draw a line, to manage ourselves, of course, we felt that we shouldn’t be in a hurry to pay that debt, more especially,  we are not convinced that  most of it  are the  sort of expenditure that any government should pay.

But that is not the issue. The issue is we want to use whatever we get locally and from the Federal Government to do our own programmes and projects. That was why immediately we came we decided to bring in measures of ensuring that all the areas of wastages, areas of loophole, are blocked. And we started from the Government House. From my own office right down to the deputy governor, the commissioners and everybody concerned, especially the civil servants and so on. We advised civil servants, especially those that were receiving two salaries, allowances and other people in the civil service that were engaged in illegal activities that were draining the resources of the government and, of course, all of us.

And when we started, of course, we were not very new because we were in government from 1999-2003. By the end of the year, in addition to our programmes and projects that we were doing in seven month, June to December, we were able to save over N20 billion cash in the treasury. That was our opening balance, over N20 billion. Now, our Internally Generated Revenue when we came in was N450,000 million – that was first half of 2011. But I can assure you that despite all the security challenges that you mentioned, we are now collecting over N1.7 billion as Internally Generated Revenue because the people have confidence in us and we have confidence in the people. We are a very serious government and people are taking us serious. That is why people are paying their taxes, because we all believe that paying tax is a social contract between the people and the government.

Now, our own plan as of last year was to make sure that by December Kano State government should be able to pay salaries and allowances for all of us that are working for the government. So that whatever comes into the state from Abuja will be utilised for major programmes and projects that will help the people of Kano State. Whether we are going to hit that target or not, I cannot say. The strategy is to improve the IGR on one hand and on the other hand make sure that the civil service and all activities of the government are being fine-tuned to make sure that government pays the minimum it is supposed to pay.

That was why we decided, as a government, that all of us should go back to 2003, in terms of overhead. When we came we realised where we stopped things had gone up and up and they were above the ceiling. And we had to come back. Except for very few places we all came back to 2003. Things are moving, and nobody is complaining. So, that is reducing the size of government, reducing the wastages, ensuring that every naira goes to the right point. And I can comfortably say that we have succeeded in that. So, total expenditure is being reduced, and IGR is being multiplied many times.

And we will see how much we can reduce government expenditure in terms of recurrent and how much we can gain on the IGR side. And that I believe we can only see by December. But you see we inherited 43, 000 civil servants.

Now, we have reduced that by 8,000 ghost workers, ranging from biometrics to physical screenings. And this will continue till we leave office because we believe that there are so many wastages within the government itself. Of course, we have to start from ourselves as government.

What I refuse to do is to accept the issue of security vote because that is the biggest area where people are siphoning money. We have gone through the records. In four years, my predecessor collected over N10 billion as security vote. I am not receiving any kobo because it doesn’t make any sense to me. If you come to Government House, if I want to give you N10.00 from my pocket, I will give you. I don’t need receipt.

A governor should always, at any given time, be accountable. He should be able to say this is what I spent in terms of giving to Mr A or organisation B or whatever. But a situation where people will take billions of naira in the name of security vote and pocket it, and nobody can ask them to account for the money, I don’t think that should be acceptable. Unless I think all of us at the leadership agree that we have to be accountable to the people and, of course, accountable to God, not only by merely mentioning God, but in the actual sense of it, then we will continue to have problem.

Some of the project you started in your first term were not attended to by your predecessor. I remember when you came and visited one higher institution you established and you shed tears when you saw the situation there. Some are insinuating that you are also leaving some of the hospitals started by your predecessor unattended to. Is this a tit-for-tat?

There is nothing like tit-for-tat. We are a very responsible government. You see, 2003-2004, one year after I left office, you go to Kano, and there was no project other than investigating Kwankwaso’s government. That was, to me, very irresponsible. It is not the sort of thing that any responsible government should do.

That is why when we came in that was not our priority. So, you could see that we came and contested election under a very difficult circumstance. We were lucky that God was on our side. Two, the young men and women in Kano and all those who believe in making Kano a better place for everybody came out and supported us. It was only the voters that stood by us to ensure that it was counted, it was recorded and it was announced. People came and stood by us from tribunal in Kano to the High Court in Kaduna and, of course, the Supreme Court here in Abuja.

If you remember, when we lost election in 2003 we didn’t go to any court. I even went to him. The first and only time in the history of this country; I am not sure if there is anywhere in the country that it happened. I am aware that people will make phone calls and congratulate the man. But to go to his house while they are celebrating and from the Government House, that was the first and only time in the history of this country. We left because we believe that politics should be played in a manner that we did.  If you have lost election today it does not mean that you will not win tomorrow.

We congratulated them. We won in 2011. They haven’t congratulated me up till today. But what is important is people have worked around the clock because they were able to compare and contrast. And, for us to be in government under that circumstance, we shouldn’t sleep. We should also pay them.

And that is what we are doing now. That is why we brought in so many programmes, so many projects. There are so many initiatives on the ground, and people are happy. And when your people are happy in a democracy that is the only way government should be happy. We are paying the minimum wage of N18,000 very comfortably, from January to date. We have employed over 2,000 young men and women into the civil service now.

Are you going to attend to those programmes that they started?

All of them, we will do all of them, any existing project. Why we didn’t start at Day One was that we didn’t believe in the cost. We have to bargain on behalf of the state. So far there were five roads that were hurriedly started within the metropolitan. All of them were reviewed and we negotiated with the contractors. We negotiated the price downward. We have accepted and we have awarded the contract. Even the hospitals, we will do that at the appropriate time. That doesn’t belong to them. It belongs to the people of Kano State, including my humble self and all other people. We will do them, but we are not in a hurry because of the money that our own government will put in.

Recently, there was a massive redeployment of corps members from Kano. As the governor of Kano State, how do you feel that Kano that used to be a place to go because of its potentials is being shunned?

You see, every time every leader will have his version of challenges to face. We are aware, going through history when our own people were being hunted and being taken to the sea and taken to Europe and America as slaves. That was the challenge of the time. Not too long ago, 1967-1970 we had civil war in this country. That was the challenge of those leaders of that time.

Even in 1999 when we came, we had all these disturbances, Yorubas killing Hausas in Ife, in Ogbomosho or Lagos or Hausas killing other tribes in Kano, in Kaduna or somewhere. All sorts of things happened in 1999-2003. I was not sleeping because I was always monitoring this road, Kano-Lagos, what was happening, who was carrying what? I had few cases where people brought in corpses from the south. And there was serious rioting, and so many people were killed. So, that was the sort of challenge at that time.

When I was governor, 1999-2003 Shari’a came. Nobody was sure where it was heading to. It was a huge challenge. I personally lost the election, not because I didn’t perform in Kano. Now, we have this challenge, security challenge. Of course, we have to get a way of sorting it out to make sure that it doesn’t go ahead and that is why, from our own side, we are working around the clock with our friends all over the north to ensure that it is sorted out once and for all.

Most primary schools built by your government have the Kwankwasiyya sign inscribed on them. Why is it so?  Some people have gone to court because of that.

Well, that is democracy. They can go to court. They can go to anywhere. You see, these are people who are jobless. Many people have been treacherous in their lives. And they have to pay the price. We have people who claim to be in our own party and who are not happy with the performance of the party.

And, in fact, some of them are not even members of the party. The party has already expelled them. But they are too junior, really, for us to worry ourselves about them. You see, in 1999-2003, we did so many programmes and projects, and until I left I never told anybody to name anything after me, after my relations. I have not done that, not even once.

But you see, we had an experience 1999-2003. Immediately we left government, our successors decided to be stealing these projects. We were just sitting in the office in the ministry of defence. They would bring a calendar, it is my project. At that time if I go out and start complaining, people will say what is wrong with that one.  Now, you see, only God knows who will come to the Government House after me.

I hope they are going to be my friends, but I cannot be sure like 1999-2003. And that is why we decided, as a government, to be like PTF (Petroleum Trust Fund), which was headed by Buhari. Anything of PTF they wrote PTF. It is still there even when there is no PTF now.  It is all over the country. We want to be like MDG. Whatever they do they write MDG. Now, we want a situation where we want people to see, to understand whatever we do.

Coincidentally, we have an ideology in Kano. And that ideology is working for us and for the people of Kano State. That is the ideology of Kwankwasiyya. Now, the rate at which we are moving in the governance of Kano is such that if not for that Kwankwasiyya we are putting, even you, if you go to Kano, you wouldn’t believe that in one year the government has been able to put over 1,000 classes, over 500 offices and similar numbers of toilets and so on.

If you left Kano one year and came back, there is no way anybody will even ever dream that a government could come within that short period of time to perform like we have on ground. And that was why, as politicians, we decided to put our stamp to say we did it. That is the point. Of course, my children will hardly go to such schools, my commissioners’ children will hardly go to such schools.

But as politicians we want to show the difference. We want to show our performance. And I think it is working. You see, if you are doing your things the right way, even your enemies will help you. Now what the enemies are saying is not that we are not performing, but we are putting our names or the name of the government there.

What is the implication? The implication is that they are publicizing it for us. And they are helping us. We are so happy that they are taking us to court; they are writing on papers that we are putting our names. Let us wait and see what the court will say. If the court says the MDG, the PTF, everybody should go and remove, whatever they wrote, so be it be it, we will go and do it. But I am sure before then we will enjoy the publicity of our enemies.

About the red cap, everybody that comes around has a red cap. And it is turning into something like a cult. If you don’t wear the red cap, may be you don’t belong, you are not acceptable. What does it signify?

Let me tell you. In Kano, we have two ideologies. We have Kwankwasiyya and we have Handamiyya. If you are Kwankwasiyya, you have to wear red cap, you don’t have to wear white gown. You can wear it in your heart. And, you see, any time you see a member of the Kwankwasiyya group, you can identify him by his actions, by his works and so on and so forth.

Not by the red cap or white gown?

Not necessarily by the red cap. That is the second stage of what you have in mind. It is to say look at me. This is me wearing red cap and white gown. Shoes are optional. And I am sure you are familiar with the history of Aminu Kano, his photograph where you see him with a red cap. Aminu Kano was always in red, white and black, black shoes. And that was the colour of PRP. I was a member of the PRP.

Malam Aminu Kano has been our mentor. We are his disciples. And we have his teachings; it is part of us. It is in our blood. And our ideology has always been that we should come and work for the poor, for the needy, the weak, the very young, the very old, the sick and anybody who need support. That is the ideology. And I can assure you that by the grace of God that is working for us in Kano because right from the governor, to deputy governor, to commissioners, right down to the ordinary person on the street to the civil servants, people are appreciating what we are doing.

Still on the issue of governance, when you first came in, you stepped on big toes on the issue of land. You confiscated some land, and people have begun going to court. But you have asked for out of court settlement. What is the situation now?

When you say land, may be, you are talking about Kofar Na’isa land. We had a big plot there, which was a political issue. Soon after we left government in 2003, we were processing to get the plot and make it as sports facility, leave it open, in case of any disaster, God forbid. Unfortunately, immediately we left, the government that came in, continued with that, but they wanted a share and sell it, give it to their friends.

Since when we were out of government, it was a wish we had that when we come into power again we would confiscate that land and return it to the people.  Coincidentally, they were not given until early 2011 when we were campaigning.

And it was an issue. They were issuing latest allocations, and people were selling N10 million, N15 million, something like that. You see, anybody who bought that land was just buying the paper they use to wrap tsire (suya). And when we were sworn in, we stopped that and demolished whatever they built there. We fenced it. And we will soon award contract for the provision of facilities.

All the games you can remember, I asked the commissioner for works and that for information, who is handling the issue of sport to work together, come out with the drawing which they did. We don’t have enough money in the budget, so we are taking a supplementary budget.

So, how are you settling out of court now?

I told you there are other cases in the court, but you see everybody is free to go court. But I will advise those who are living in glasse house to avoid throwing stones because they will be shocked if others start throwing stones at them.

As an engineer and one who has worked for many years in Water Resources and Engineering Constructing Agency (WRECA), what are the challenges of providing Kano with water?

Well, you see, so far we’ve spent over N5 billion to purchase the pipes we are laying now. They are in the country, 600mm diameter from Bagwai to Bichi to Miltara. We have also purchased 100mm diameter pipe. They are all in Lagos at the Port. And may be by next week they will start leaving Lagos to Kano. Of course, we are also working on all other major treatment works, the Challawa treatment works, and, of course, Joda. We are there and also Tamburawa. So, we are working round the clock.

Now, we have taken care of what to do to bring the water in to the city. The next stage we are doing is to look at areas that still do not have water for whatever reason. Some of the reasons, of course, we have the issue of smaller diameter pipes. We have the issue of blockages and so many local problems.

By the time we complete the Challawa pipe laying and that of Bichi complex, I want to assure you that most of the areas of Kano metropolitan will get water.

Of course, we have this electricity challenge; it is all over the country. We have decided to purchase generators that have the power to pump water into the city. Most of the areas that were not having water before we came into power in 2011 are now getting water supply in the metropolitan.

So, also all other local governments outside the metropolitan; there are places where we are laying pipes, there are places where we are buying new generators and pumps and, of course, the issue of daily supply of chlorine, alum and so on. And we keep on doing them.

Governors in the past who believed they had worked for their people come back to contest for the presidency. What do we expect of you in 2015?

You see, people are worrying themselves too much about what comes after finishing their terms. I believe that is wrong. What is right is that you have an opportunity to deliver within four years. Now we are just one year, may be two three months. In other words, you have about two and a half years or more.  I think that is the issue for me now. Anybody can think of what he thinks he wants to be.

But what is important, in my own opinion is, if you are given an opportunity, what do you do about it? I think that is the most important. That is what we are trying to get right now. We have a responsibility. People have voted for us. Now we are in government by the grace of God. Now, let’s take our time to deliver.

Women and youths are at the fore front of needing some sort of assistance to be self-reliant. As such, what is your government doing in empowering women and youths?

Women are the leaders in Kano. What we did was first and foremost to empower women. We selected 2000 women per local government. Right now we have finished training 1600 and given them a minimum of N10, 000 worth of capital free to go and start their businesses. Immediately after Sallah we will finish the 400 per local government.  And then we will take another 1000. That is 3000 times 44. And this will continue by the grace of God until the end of our administration. The training is almost weekly on that particular programme.

We have many other programmes, the poultry programme in Tukui-Makoda local government. We have so far trained 800 women. And that one is a boarding school, is an institute. We take women, mostly; in fact all of them  married women, keep them for three weeks, train them on  how to keep poultry, give them Islamic education, all sorts of things within three weeks, and if they are going, we give them package: some day-old chicks, feeds, medication and so on.

We are monitoring them. That is 800 from that institute. And that institute was having 200 per set. We did four sets. Now, after Sallah we will start with 600 women and give them capital.  We have other institutes. Totally, we are doing 20 including the university, the Northwest University which we are opening in October. So, the state will have two universities, Kano University of Science and Technology and the Northwest University which is going to be managed by the Northwest States. Now, we have many other programmes within these institutes. We are building a brand new nursing school. We have just recently awarded a programme of N1 billion for the construction of the hostel.

So, not only that, we are also establishing three cities: Kwankwasiyya City, Amana City and of course Bandurawo City. It is very difficult to remember when last a city was established. But with facilities, modern facilities, this is the first time.

We are creating a new GRA. It was just like Abuja, it was just a forest, a bush. Infrastructure was provided and people are building good houses. So, the same thing with Kano too. We realised there is this dire need of facilities, plots with all the services, and that is what we are providing.

Do you subscribe to the idea of state police as canvassed by some of your colleagues?

We don’t support state police. Kano has been peaceful for many years. Kano has 7,000 police now; Lagos has 37,000; Rivers has 19,000; I think Kaduna has between 13,000 and 15,000.

But police are not happy to go to Kano now for whatever reason, so we are trying to get the approval of Mr President to allow the Nigeria Police Force to go and recruit police in our state –Nigeria police, not state police. In fact, Kano State government is willing and ready to assist in training them and let them be posted to Kano because we don’t have enough.

We don’t have enough but when it comes to the issue of state police we don’t support it.

Northern governors have been complaining about lack of fairness in federal revenue allocation; what is the way forward?

There are issues that we don’t support. For instance, the issue of onshore/offshore is another issue that we don’t support. You see, if you have gold in your land and you are claiming certain percentage to be paid to you, one can understand that. But if you have oil wells 200 nautical miles away from your land and you are claiming that that well is your own, I don’t think that is correct.

I want to salute former President Olusegun Obasanjo. You know, when the issue came up, I spoke with him and based on that I went and called elders meeting in Kano, including the Emir of Kano. I also requested for the northern governors meeting which we held in Kaduna. In fact, President Obasanjo sent the former chairman of the boundary commission and he made a presentation; the distance between these wells with the land.

Our problem in the north and what we are trying to correct now is leadership and knowing what to do and what not to do. I remember, of course, Obasanjo refused to sign the bill because it was not fair and it was taken back to the National Assembly for two-thirds (to override the veto).

The night before, there was nothing I did not do to my members in Kano especially. In fact, the night before Senator Barnabas Gemade, then National Chairman of the PDP, called me, and also called all the governors in the north to beg us to talk to all our members, seeing that our members were going to give two- thirds to the bill.

I called all our members, but to my dismay, they went and supported onshore/offshore and sold out. That is the most unfortunate thing that happened to the north in this political dispensation, from 1999 to date. We knew what happened. How could that bill get two-thirds without the support of our members? The unfortunate thing is that because our capacity is so low, even those who did that are pretending to be heroes of the north.

We told so many people that we are not against derivation. I was in the constitutional conference and I know how we came about the 13% derivation, not only that we have seen the consequences of that single action by our members of the National Assembly, that is why many of us are concerned with the constitution review now.

Whether we like it or not, what we are seeing today is partly the consequence of the action of the past that made the north very poor. And I think that is what is binding the north together –we are poor, we are illiterate, we are sick; I don’t see anything that is common to us which we can mention other than these.

So I am personally concerned about constitutional amendment because I have the feeling that if care is not taken, many of us will be made poorer. And of course I don’t believe it is in the interest of the north, I believe it is also not in the interest of the south. I say this because in a country where you have two sections, one for the rich and one for the poor, that is the beginning of a huge crisis.

That is why we are appealing to our members in the National Assembly and all those concerned to be more cautious. I, also, want those who will benefit from our weakness to be conscious of the fact that the more the rich makes the poor poorer, certainly the more the poorer will not sleep and when the poorer does not sleep, the rich will find it equally difficult to sleep.