Yusuf Maitama Sule []1929-2017]

The death on Monday, July 3, 2017 of Alhaji Yusuf Maitama Sule, Dan Masanin Kano at the age of 88 robbed Nigeria of one of its most prominent elder statesmen and many say the last of the great orators from the First Republic. He died at an Egyptian hospital after heart complications necessitated his transfer […]

The death on Monday, July 3, 2017 of Alhaji Yusuf Maitama Sule, Dan Masanin Kano at the age of 88 robbed Nigeria of one of its most prominent elder statesmen and many say the last of the great orators from the First Republic. He died at an Egyptian hospital after heart complications necessitated his transfer from Abdullahi Wase Hospital in Kano.  His funeral in Kano the following day was attended by thousands of mourners, many state governors, leading royal fathers and a Federal Government delegation led by the Chief of Staff to the President.

Born in Unguwar Yola ward in Kano city on October 1, 1929, Yusuf Maitama Sule had his elementary and Middle School education in Kano before moving in 1943 to Kaduna College, which later became Barewa College. In 1946 he attended a teachers’ training course and thereafter taught at Kano Middle School until 1953.  He was later transferred to the Ministry of Information where, on account of his eloquence, he quickly became chief information officer. The late Emir of Kano Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi I made him the first ever Dan Masanin Kano in the 1950s. Maitama Sule was elected to the Federal House of Representatives in 1959 under the banner of NPC. Prime Minister Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa later appointed him the Minister of Mines and Power at the age of 29. He was the youngest minister in the First Republic. 

Following the First Republic’s overthrow in the January 1966 coup, he returned to Kano and rejoined the services of Kano Emirate Council.  When Kano State was created in 1967, he was made Commissioner for Local Governments under the military governor Police Commissioner Audu Bako. General Murtala Muhammad appointed him the Federal Commissioner of Public Complaints Commission in 1976. As the nation’s ombudsman, Maitama Sule toured the country and commendably executed that assignment before he resigned at the resumption of party politics in 1978 and joined the National Party of Nigeria, NPN.  

He contested in NPN’s presidential primaries and finished second after Alhaji Shehu Shagari. Although they were due for a run-off, Maitama Sule and Malam Adamu Ciroma withdrew before the run-off and conceded to Shagari.  In 1979 President Shehu Shagari appointed him as Ambassador and Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York.  There, he chaired the UN’s Special Committee Against Apartheid, discharging the two assignments with great dedication and his vaunted oratory.

He retired from politics after the Second Republic collapsed in 1983. Maitama Sule then assumed the role of a statesman who was much sought after for his accessibility, his humble disposition, his intimate knowledge of Nigerian politics due to his front row seat in the First and Second Republics, his great oratorical skills as well as his unwavering commitment to the unity of Nigeria.  For three decades Alhaji Yusuf Maitama Sule featured prominently as guest speaker at hundreds if not thousands of public lectures, launchings, commissioning etc. His message was always the same: Nigeria’s unity, desire for inter-communal and inter-religious peace, mutual coexistence and the potential for Nigeria’s future greatness. 

He was also a very good family man. His eldest son Mukhtar Maitama Sule said, “My father was a great man and a father to all and sundry. I cannot count the number of people that have grown up in this house under his care.  Some are still alive and others have died.  His wealth was for all.” His grandson Alhaji Hassan Mahmoud said he was “everything to us, a father, a guardian, a mentor and above all a pillar of the family.” President Buhari said in his tribute, “We shall not soon see the likes of him.”

Maitama Sule died at a time when inter-communal tension in Nigeria was high and his soothing and experienced voice was highly needed to calm frayed nerves. He was survived by ten children and many grandchildren. May the great and peace loving soul of Alhaji Yusuf Maitama Sule find eternal rest in Aljannat.