Remembering a humble public servant, Mallam Gusau, Shettiman Sokoto

Nourah Bamalli Thirteen years ago, Nigerians woke up to the sad news of the demise of Mallam Yahaya Gusau, Shettiman Sokoto. He died on December 15, 2008, at the age of 93.  Mallam began his career as a teacher. He told me that Alhaji Shehu Shagari, Nigeria’s president from 1979 to 1983 was amongst many […]

Nourah Bamalli

Thirteen years ago, Nigerians woke up to the sad news of the demise of Mallam Yahaya Gusau, Shettiman Sokoto. He died on December 15, 2008, at the age of 93. 

Mallam began his career as a teacher. He told me that Alhaji Shehu Shagari, Nigeria’s president from 1979 to 1983 was amongst many of his students. 

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Gusau also held several other positions. He was one of the pioneer civil servants after independence, rising to the position of a permanent secretary. He was later appointed a minister of economic development, even as he held board membership in several government and private organisations before his demise. 

I came across the name, Mallam Yahaya Gusau through the media, but my direct contact with him came in 1995 when both of us were involved with the Petroleum (Special) Trust Fund (PTF). I was the consulting project manager in charge of North-West, while Mallam was a member of the Board of Trustees and chairman of the zone. During this time, and before I disengaged from the assignment at the end of 1998, when the then president-elect, Olusegun Obasanjo, announced his plan to “scrap” the PTF on assumption of office, we had a series of acquaintances with Mallam Gusau. 

We inspected projects and launched several revolving fund initiatives in all the states of the zone, during which time we paid courtesy calls on all military administrators and traditional rulers. 

Soon, Mallam identified and took interest in my work and started to relate with me like a father to his son. On my part, I made the extra effort to get close. The more my appreciation of his many wonderful qualities, the closer our relationship grew. 

Without mincing words, Mallam was highly disciplined, by all standards. He was honest in all facets of his life and straight forward and objective in every action. He was down-to-earth and humble in his transactions. He would not only guide but also lead by example on good manners. Mallam was modest and easy-going in his dealings. You could easily notice his calmness and efficiency the moment you had any dealing with him. His analysis of issues would always impress you because of the logic and neutrality contained therein. He was a great man, full of wisdom and maturity, a perfect gentleman to the core. Whenever he spoke, boundless knowledge was sent out. He spoke the Queen’s English while his native language also remained unadulterated. 

In the course of my interaction with him, I realised that throughout his life, Mallam was financially prudent. 

In one of our discussions, he told me that he took an early voluntary retirement in the 1960s to cater for his personal goals, but he continued to be invited to render services. He said that when General Gowon became head of state, emissaries were sent to him for a ministerial appointment, but he rejected the offer. A more powerful team was later drafted through the traditional institution for him to reconsider the offer, but he stood his ground. To his greatest amazement, General Gowon himself arrived Gusau to personally speak to him, insisting that his government needed people of virtue, courage and truthfulness. 

Gowon’s superior logic convinced Mallam to accept the offer, but on a condition that he would serve for only a year or two. They agreed and he was appointed as minister of economic development and reconstruction. 

He resigned at the appointed time and returned home to rest. But there was no rest for him as the late General Sani Abacha also came calling for Mallam to serve the PTF, followed by chains of board appointments. He accepted those that met his conditions.

One day, on one of our trips, Mallam said, “Bamalli, I have noticed how you spend money to dress well for every occasion, looking neat and smart all the time. How many houses and investments have you secured so far from the long period of your employment, for the ‘rainy day’?” I wondered which rainy day. And of course, the answer to him was negative, and the man started to reprimand me and our generation for wasteful expenditure in place of sacrificing to plan well for our future. He said he always lived within his means and had never borrowed throughout his employment life. He would save from his monthly salaries until he secured the right amount for an investment, and still saved for rainy days. He recounted an experience at the time he was suspended from his teaching job during the colonial era. He and some colleagues had challenged the authority of the colonial principal, and, pending investigations, they were placed on suspension without pay. He recalled how his colleagues suffered significantly while he remained unobstructed and survived purely on his past savings. When they were reinstated and paid arrears, he went for more investments. 

Mallam took the pain to show me many of the properties he invested in. I noticed that he was extremely delighted, in the hope that I would imbibe his prudent lifestyle. Alas, our generation is the spending type, but I truly treasured his principles and soon started to adopt part of his wisdom with humility; and today, one is smiling.

One spectacular character of Mallam I noticed during this time was that at no circumstance would he use the brand new Peugeot 504 assigned to him by the PTF for any of his personal activities; instead, he would use his old Peugeot 404 station wagon, which was my age or even older. Even after retirement, he maintained the habit of going to his personal office by 8.30am and would close at 2.00pm. I was curious and asked him for the wisdom, and Mallam invited me to his office in Kaduna, above PZ building on the Ahmadu Bello Way, to see for myself. On entering the office, a female secretary offered me a visitors’ form to complete. I hesitated, but she made it clear that it was the only condition for entry. I simply filled my name and ignored the columns of address, purpose, etc. But the young woman again recapped that without those details I could as well go away. All protocols observed, I was ushered in, and behold, Mallam was sitting behind a big and neat desk, clean and spacious office, drinking coffee and reading newspapers. He would always stand up to shake hands. He told me that he had maintained the habit of coming to the office to keep fit and meet people. Above all, the office provided him a good avenue to review the rentals from his numerous properties, as well as collect dividends and bank statements from his huge stock investments.

During my various visits to his home in Kaduna, Mallam had discussed many issues of his life with me, surely not to impress me, but in the hope that I would learn to lead a satisfactory and decent life. I can recall that during my first visit, he received me in his living room in a hot weather. When he noted my sweat, he politely asked me to switch on the table fan. I did, but the blades did not move. In our usual impatience, I moved to alter the speed to the next higher level when he halted me. A few seconds later, the fan started to rotate, and soon, it operated at top level. 

As I turned to look at him in surprise, he was already smiling and said he bought the fan sometime in the 1940s, along with his kerosene fridge and both had continued to serve him at no maintenance cost. I was ashamed of how quickly our generation would replace almost anything for no reason at all, as a mark of wasteful expenditure.  Indeed, our generation should study and imbibe the lives of people like Mallam Gusau. 

When Mallam was heading the marketing board, he also told me the case of a businessman who received official allocation of certain consignments and felt obliged to “pay his dues,” as is common nowadays. Mallam objected, but feeling obliged, the man decided to go to his bank and lodged the amount. He told me that every time he visited his bank, he would first demand for his balance to compare with his last transaction. This time, he immediately noticed a huge difference on the account balance and drew the attention of the manager on the mix-up. He was updated on the transaction. With our current mindset, one would consider this as a neat and perfect job, but not for Mallam. He rebuked the manager but also found out that the businessman had an overdrawn account in the bank. Mallam directed the manager to debit the exact amount and reduce the loan balance of the businessman. 

As he told his story, I wished our generation could practise a portion of these virtues for our country to be better. May his soul continue to rest in peace, amin.

I seize this opportunity to once again condole his family, as we pray for Allah (SWA) to forgive and reward him with Jannatul-Firdausi and grant his family and the country the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss, amin.

Bamalli can be reached on [email protected]