Wishing for the past in Zamfara

Political observers have started expressing their views as things unfold differently from the expectations of the Zamfara masses. Some of them expressed dismay over the manner the government handles state finances, and looking back with nostalgia to the Mahmud Shinkafi era, when, they said, development was the priority. The reasons for this sudden change are […]

Political observers have started expressing their views as things unfold differently from the expectations of the Zamfara masses. Some of them expressed dismay over the manner the government handles state finances, and looking back with nostalgia to the Mahmud Shinkafi era, when, they said, development was the priority.

The reasons for this sudden change are not far-fetched. Shinkafi, when he was governor, concerned himself with planning and administering the long- ravaged and neglected Zamfara State to provide the foundation for a better future for generations yet unborn.

Despite the controversial outcome of the last governorship election in the state, which denied Shinkafi a second term, the impressive edifices of development his administration left behind all over Zamfara State continue to attract fervent prayers for his return. Even school teachers and pupils in the state who were liberated from unpaid salaries and dilapidated structures and boosted with teaching aids and hitherto scarce text and exercise books have been dedicating songs to the glory of the Shinkafi administration, while the youths cannot thank him enough for the skills acquisition centres he established across the state.

All these pleasant recollections of better days gone by have also been triggered by the apparent lethargy and administrative limbo that has characterized the Abdulaziz Yari government since it came on board. As someone who has been in the political system for so long and who is supposed to be aware and sensitive to the glaring development needs of Zamfarawa, Governor Yari was expected to sustain the tempo of development he inherited instead of getting paralyzed by indecision and evident lack of preparation for the burden of leadership. It is being alleged all over the state that the state of arrested development being witnessed is a direct result of the serious uncertainty on the genuineness and future of his election victory which is being robustly challenged in court. In particular, the sudden cessation in payment of civil servants salaries and drying up of recurrent and capital expenditure without reason, is attributed by the common man to the executive hypertension being treated with financial profligacy.

It is therefore not difficult to understand why the people of Zamfara, who are associated with the Yari administration, have been silenced in their initial excitement by the majority of people who believe in the prudence and effectiveness of Shinkafi’s development agenda. Indeed the so-called devil you know is much better than the saint you never knew ! The people who ushered in the unknown Saint Yari cannot give reasonable answer to the blunder of initiating a negative change that only returned Zamfara to square one of the infamous Yarima era when there was government but no governance, budget but no economic development on ground and charity at the expense of state treasury.

It is a pity to hear people claiming that Shinkafi’s fault was in surrounding himself with a few people who did not allow the masses to get near him. They mention Mallaha, Musa Zubairu and Muntari Shinkafi as those who dominated the Shinkafi government but they deliberately ignored the undeniable fact that each of these people were accomplished in their lives prior to the Shinkafi era and that they played critical roles without which the government could not have survived even one year considering the powerful forces from within and outside the state in opposition to Mahmud Shinakfi’s success. Mallaha was and still is a business mogul who consistently sacrificed his wealth to boost the PDP’s fortunes after the defection, Musa Zubairu was the master strategist of the government and party whose foresight and intelligence left enemies of progress in the dust while Muntari Shinkafi deployed his Harvard background to connect foreign investors to the immense natural resources of the state. In any case is it not better for government to deliver the dividends of democracy to the masses than to be an exclusive club for a few people to be patronized as the Yari complainants wish?

The truth that Zamfarawa must face is that the paralysis gripping the Yari government is traceable to the over-bearing interest of its political godfather Senator Yarima who is again neck deep in converting our dear state into the cash cow and launch pad for yet another presidential campaign project in 2015 just as he did in the build up to 2007. In the rest of Nigeria where such political godfathers ruled the waves there has been massive realignment to eliminate them and situate political power directly in the hands of the masses. When will Zamfarawa break the jinx?

Marke, a retired public health worker, wrote from Gusau