‘Real courage requires wisdom.”
–Carey Kinsolving
Omoniyi Salaudeen
The prolonged rift between the Governor of Kano State, Abdullahi Ganduje and the ousted Emir Muhammed Sunusi 11 has finally run its complete circle. It’s been quite a while since the festering crisis that culminated in the dethronement of the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) assumed public interest and for only God knows why. Some linked it to differences in political persuasion, others alleged gross insubordination.
A letter signed by the Secretary to the State Government, Alhaji Usman Alhaji, which announced the removal and dethronement of the embattled Emir alluded to this insinuation: “The Emir of Kano is in total disrespect to lawful instructions from the office of the state governor and other lawful authorities, including his persistent refusal to attend official meetings and programmes organized by the government without any lawful justification which amount to total insubordination.”
This is no longer a time for blame game. Rightly or wrongly, the matter has been laid to rest. And the deposed Emir is already moving on with his life in far away Nasarawa State, where he has been cooling his feet after a prolonged battle of wit. In his own right, Sanusi is a courageous fighter. Even while the face-off lasted and Governor Ganduje decided to split the Emirate into four to curtail his power and influence, the deposed Emir maintained his vocal and irrepressible disposition, speaking against the action and inaction of the Northern elite on issues of poverty, illiteracy, menace of Almajiri, among other societal ills that stunted the development of the North.
In his recent address at the birthday anniversary of Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State, he told the region’s leaders what they would not like to hear, declaringthat they would destroy themselves, if they fail to address the challenges facing the region. “The truth is nobody who is elite in Northern Nigeria today is happy. You can’t be happy that 87 per cent of poverty in Nigeria is in the North. You can’t be happy with millions of children out of school, you can’t be happy with nine states in the North contributing almost 50 per cent of entire malnutrition in the country, you can’t be happy with drug problem, you can’t be happy with Boko Haram, you can’t be happy with the Almajiri problem that we have,” he quipped.
In the build up to the last general elections, Sanusi deliberately provoked Ganduje’s icy distemper; hit him below the belt and accused him of wasting state’s resources in far away China under the pretext of looking for investors when in actual fact there were millions of out-of-school children that needed to be taken off the streets.
It was not, therefore, surprising that the reconciliation panel led by a former military Head of State, Abdulsalami Abubakar, submitted that the comments of Muhammad Sanusi II on some issues embarrassed the Kano government and the Federal Government.
In doing all of this, Sanusi was merely walking a familiar terrain. In his tenure as the governor of Central Bank, he brought his radical approach, as well as penchant for controversy into the banking sector and ultimately pitched himself against some vested interests. Coming into the leadership position of the apex bank in 2009 in the midst of the global financial crisis which culminated in the collapse of many Nigerian banks, he took a bold step to beam the searchlight into the activities of the Chief Executive Officers of the failed financial institutions who had hitherto enjoyed political protection and made some startling revelations of how they swindled millions of innocent depositors of their hard-earned money. The radical reform he initiated saved the banking sector of an imminent collapse. That he did at the risk of his life.
Speaking about his experience with the impunity of the cabal milking the economy, he said: “One thing I learnt from the banking system is that they are not to be feared. If you don’t want their money and you are not afraid of them, you will destroy them. So long we do not overcome the fear of them, we are not going to find solution to the problems of this country and we are not going to reach our true potentials.”
Done with the bank thieves, Sanusi stirred another controversy about jumbo pay for members of the National Assembly, saying it was not sustainable. And when the ostensibly angry lawmakers ordered him to appear before them to tender his apology, he called their bluff and dared them to sack him, as his father’s name was not governor of Central Bank.
The last straw that eclipsed his tenure as the governor of CBN was the letter he wrote to former President Goodluck Jonathan dated September 25, where he accused the NNPC of failure to remit $49.8 billion to the Federation Account between 2012 and 2013. He, however, ran into troubled water when Jonathan later learnt that the letter had been leaked to ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo. And he was sufficiently harassed, intimidated and spanked for the unruly conduct. “From then, I knew I had signed my equivalent for death warrant. But I said I was not resigning. He got very angry and said ‘whether you like it or not, you’re going to leave that of-fice. I cannot continue to work with you. Either you or I will leave govern-ment.”
While the hours of waiting lasted, Sanusi had his eyes on the seat of Emir. Unfortunately, the same fate that befell his grandfather in the regime of the late Sir Ahmadu Bello, the then premier of Northern region, also befell him. What a coincidence of history!
While some concerned stakeholders applaud the ousted Emir for his courage for spearheading the campaign for a change of social order, critics blame him for his inability to distinguish between zeal and zealotry. Since the constitution empowers the governors to hire and fire traditional title-holders, they argued, he should have employed wisdom to preach a reform of the entrenched aristocratic tradition.
Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, a grandson of an Emir, was born on July 31, 1961 into the prominent family of Alhaji Mohammadu Sanusi, who was a permanent secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the 1960s. He obtained his Bachelor of Science degree in Economics in 1981 from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, as well as Masters of Science degree in Economics with a distinction in Monetary Policy. In 1985, he joined the banking sector where he worked with Icon Limited (Merchant Bankers), a subsidiary of now Guaranty Trust Bank of New York, and Baring Brothers of London. He was appointed the governor of CBN in 2009 where he retired to assume the position of Emir.