The Obasanjo-Atiku feud nearly wrecked me –Boni Haruna
What were instances you found very challenging as a governor? For me, the most challenging time was confronting the pressure on me during the days of Obasanjo–Atiku political strife. I came out of that quarrel severely bruised. It was a period when the Federal Government, its agencies and some forces within and outside Adamawa deployed […]
What were instances you found very challenging as a governor?
For me, the most challenging time was confronting the pressure on me during the days of Obasanjo–Atiku political strife. I came out of that quarrel severely bruised. It was a period when the Federal Government, its agencies and some forces within and outside Adamawa deployed all the resources at their disposal to undermine my government, harass me through contrived impeachment plots, arbitrarily freezing my government’s accounts, arresting and detaining almost every member of my State Executive Council, chairmen of local governments councils and development area administrators. The impeachment aspect was the anti-climax. It was like a Hollywood movie. A whole aircraft, Dornier 228 was chartered to fly in the ring leaders of the State House of Assembly Members to Yola from Abuja where they had been camped and tutored on the impeachment process.
They were to use all possible means, including the Governor Joshua Dariye method. Former governor, Dariye, was illegally impeached by six out of the 24 members of the State House of Assembly. It was a war-like situation, all because I placed my loyalty where I was not expected to place it at that particular time. But most importantly, there was a well-coordinated conspiracy with the active backing of the Presidency then to cause a change in the state’s power equation in the 2007 general elections. So, it was an all-out war for those involved. All these were part of the quarrel which was quite unfortunate.
When you look back, how do you feel about all that happened? Do you have any regrets for your political disposition those days?
I feel bad about it. It is only in our kind of plural democracy and in our kind of federalism that an agency of the Federal Government can be used arbitrarily to cripple a government of a federating unit on account of political differences.
As to regrets, I really don’t have regrets because, although some regarded my loyalty to former Vice-President Atiku as politically suicidal that time, I still think that it was morally right for me to have stood by the former VP. For me, I considered that period in his political life as his most compelling moment of need for such a support from me. I admit that there is a prize for everything. I have paid the prize for my dispassionate service to the state, for standing to be counted during the country’s defining moment and for being at the right place in my support for the former VP.
What is your relationship with the former VP now?
It’s cordial.
How did you survive the impeachment plots?
It’s a long story, a combination of all forces, including divine, media, legal and political forces. It was distressful, but it was also exciting seeing such wicked and unjustified conspiracy collapsing like a pack of cards given all the resources deployed. The most interesting thing about the impeachment plot was even the allegations of misconduct. One of such allegations was that I diverted USD 280 million which I recovered from overpayment of our foreign loans. It was obvious that those who labelled the allegations for the members knew nothing about the subject matter. It was true that I was the one who successfully initiated the process of recovering the said overpayment on our foreign debt stock. At the time they initiated their impeachment proceedings against me, it was already a settled matter that Adamawa State Government had proved its case for a refund of overpayment on its foreign debt stock which was deducted from our statutory allocation over the years. My traducers were the same forces that blocked the release of the money to me. And given my relationship with the then federal government on account of my political disposition, such money could not even have been released to me. This was even at a time when the accounts of my government were consistently frozen by an agency of the federal government. Yet they still made it as one of the allegations in their contrived impeachment against me. Posterity was to later vindicate me.
By your action you initiated a process leadingto the recovery of money that would have been lost. How did you do it?
We actually started this process in 2001 through our contacts at the Debt Management Office (DMO) where we were first told of a possible refund if we could prove our case. At one of the National Economic Council meetings sometime in 2004, the Debt Management Office gave every state its foreign debt profile. Ours was USD 258million. This was in the face of massive deductions from our statutory allocation for the payment of these debts. I came back to the state and decided to have a look at the debt profile again. I decided to set up a nine-member debt reconciliation committee headed by one Idrisu Pella who is now late. He was a thorough bureaucrat who discharged any assignment given to him with finesse. He was the encyclopedia of the state when it came to matters of finance and administration. The secretary of that committee was the commissioner of finance in the present government by the name of Daniel Kiri. They worked tirelessly and painstakingly. We appointed a consultant to facilitate our foreign contracts and to generate more facts as regards to the foreign loan portfolio. The consultant along with members of the committee and some members of the State House of Assembly undertook a trip to London on a fact-finding mission. Following a meeting with Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD) in London, our consultant’s lawyer reported that it was obvious from inquiries that our state was entitled to repayment of overpayment made over the years. At every stage of the recovery process, the State House of Assembly members were carried along.
There is this claim that your government did not do in eight years what the present government has done in less than four years. At a point the EFCC picked you. How do you feel about such impression?
It is laughable. They are challenging me to a debate that may involve comparative analysis of our governments’ receipts and expenditures. Besides what I met on ground in 1999 after years of military administration was not what this government met in 2007. They met a functional system left behind. Within my first term of four years, using the little funds at our disposal, I established a state university, I completed several projects inherited from the previous governments, such as the state secretariat at over N800 million, including furnishing; the state House of Assembly at over N180 million, including furnishing; completed and rehabilitated about 13 boarding schools and some hospital projects across the state worth over N2.5 billion; constructed bridges in Mubi, Uba; completed some rural electrification projects; acquired properties, such as the liaison office and governors lodge in Maitama, Abuja; reactivated the state broadcasting and television stations through the procurement of transmitters and establishment of booster stations at over N500m; paid JAMB, NECO and WAEC fees for all our students in public schools; re-introduced boarding and feeding in our secondary schools; increased our students’ scholarship allowances by 1000%; paid leave transport grant to civil servants; paid salaries as they fell due, and so many things.
In my second term, out of my statutory allocation of N82.2 billion, we continued to pay salaries as they became due. From 1999 – 2007, I paid over N39 billion out of our total receipt of N114.8 billion on salaries and Leave Transport grants, leaving about N85 billion for capital and other recurrent expenditures I left monthly salary bill and running cost to ministries, Boards and Parastals at about N520 million Naira after putting in place a computerized salary system that eliminated obvious wastes and leakages. We built the Adamawa Plaza in Abuja at N2.1 billion; we built the Jimeta Modern Market at N3.4 billion out of which we paid N3.2b before I left office; we constructed Mohammed Mustapha Way, Gimba Road and part of Atiku Abubakar Way, Bekaji Way, etc at over N3.5 billion. We Constructed a banquet hall, new council chambers, guest houses, computer centre inside the Government House, several boreholes, rehabilitated hospitals in Michika, Mubi, Song, Garkida, Numan, Ganye, Yola, etc all in our second term allocations. Again look at what this government got – N149.6billion plus foreign loan of USD 75 plus over USD 180 million recovered from the overpayment on our foreign loan all in less than four years. Yet they have the audacity to talk about comparison in performance. I started my government with monthly allocation of N180 million. They started their own with N2.2 billion.
For the benefit of those who will still want make any point, we did not promote nepotism in appointments or in extending government patronage to people.
We were not engaged in secret and selective employment because we wanted to exclude particular sections of the people and abusing the constitutional provision of Federal Character. We did not settle people with appointments of unaccountable number of Special Assistants whose salary bill is more than the salary bill of the 25,000 workforce I left behind in the Civil Service. We were not engaged in promoting ethnic or religious sentiments or imbalance in access to government patronage and privileges or through our policy actions. We never failed to pay running costs to our ministries, boards and parastatals to ensure maximum productivity. We did not promote poverty by limiting access to government contracts to a restricted class of a countable few. I never chose to stay and run government affairs from my private house in eight years in violation of a State law which provides that the Governor, the Deputy Governor, the Speaker and the Deputy Speaker shall be provided with official accommodation from where the affairs of state government shall be ran. No option was contemplated by the law. Since government is a continuous process, I never refused to pay the liabilities on inherited projects for partisan reasons. We did not run down the education sector by restoring the burden of paying school fees on our peasant parents. We did not stop feeding in our post primary schools. The State University I established and had NUC rating of 87% is at present rated less than 50%.
At the inception of the present administration in the state, your government was accused of leaving a staggering debt of N22 billion. How were these debts incurred?
This government has a character of spreading falsehood as a defense mechanism. When they made that claim, I swiftly denied it in a statement and challenged them to what lawyers call the strictest proof of their allegation. The truth is that they knew they were going to collect the “Lost Money” I recovered for the state which is more than the N22 billion debts they alleged I left behind. The second installment of the recovered money they collected alone was USD 85.9 million, which is about N12.6 billion. So they had to prepare the minds of the people to justify spending the recovered money and to also justify taking USD 50 million loan which they were reported to have taken from a Christian organisation in the United States of America shortly after they made the allegation. These are people in government who don’t even know the basic principle of government as a continuous process. An evidence that government is a continuous process was their collection of millions of dollars which a previous government worked out. They are now reaping from where they did not sow because government is a continuous process; yet they lack the courtesy of acknowledging our efforts.
You are angry with this government. What is your relationship with the Governor?
I’m not angry. I am only putting the records straight. Even if I am, I’m justified because this government has no regard for anybody. This is a governor I wrote to in June this year, four years after leaving office, drawing his attention to his government’s non-payment of the entitlements of the former public office holders of my administration, including myself, in spite of their claim in several quarters, including the Presidency, that they have not paid us. Their reason for nonpayment of the entitlements is inexplicable. If their excuse was lack of funds, my administration made the state richer on our exit by over N25b from the recovered money on foreign debt repayment which this government secretly collected in two installments. To date, he has not deemed it necessary to respond to my letter. I was the Governor of this state for eight years before he assumed the office. I deserve some respect from him. He should cast his mind back and ask if this is how I treated him when I was in that office. In civilian democratic governance I am his senior. I take precedence over him when the political history of Adamawa is written. Nobody is asking him for any form of patronage. As I had said before, it is baffling how they always want to claim originality as if there was no yesterday and as if there wouldn’t be tomorrow which is in the hands of God.
As one of the former Governors of Adamawa and in fact the first to have served for two terms of eight years, what would you consider your footprints?
Governance is not only about physical or capital development. Be that as it may, I’d first appreciate God for His mercies and for the grace He gave me to serve Adamawa State in the capacity of a governor. Honour and Glory goes to the Almighty for such opportunity. It was not an easy task, because the challenges were quiet enormous. Our policy was to continue from where the past governments stopped as far as implementation of government policies and programmes was concerned. We were not attracted to the idea of initiating new projects when those inherited remained uncompleted and were still relevant to the needs of the People. Our major area of priority was education. We saw to the establishment of a state University which was conceived by the 2nd Republic administration of late Governor Abubakar Barde in 1981. All other levels of education got a boost because of the quality of management by us. The primary education sector which was driven under the Universal Basic Education witnessed the most revolutionary transformation which was why many trophies were won by the State Universal Basic Education Board during our administration. We set the pace in our access to the Federal government UBE grant by being prompt in paying our counterpart dues. We placed emphasis on the provision of more classrooms, rehabilitation and reconstruction of existing ones that were in a state of decay due to longtime neglect. Although our capital requirement for this sector alone for it to be turned around was put at over N25 billion, our capital receipt for eight years for this sector was less than N5 billion out of which there was virtually no local government area we did not make our presence in the primary education sector.
We reformed the state civil service. We were able to deal with the reoccurring problem of ghost workers, multiple payments, inflated salary payment and other several sharp practices through which the government was loosing so much money. At the end of the exercise, there was no worker that was retrenched, while irregular appointments were regularized. Savings were made from which the government employed new workers across all the cadres. We were also able to establish a data base for the workers and check the abuse in the manipulation of dates for retirement from the service.
In the health sector, we rebuilt hospitals, including the historical Garkida General Hospital, a Christian mission facility built since 1948 before it was taken over by the government; rehabilitated others and built new ones across the state. We successfully caused the reversal of the taking over of the Yola Specialist Hospital by the Federal Government to serve as a Federal Medical Centre after years of inaction on the improvement of the existing facilities. We complemented the efforts of the Federal Government in terms of funding for the eventual takeoff of the Medical Centre. Today, the Federal Medical Centre Yola, is one of the best in design, planning quality of infrastructure, and service delivery.