I have never met Governor Muhammad Badaru Abubakar of Jigawa State, and when he came to power more than six years ago, I was one of those who feared he was going to derail what many at that time saw as his predecessor’s unbeatable legacies. So dismissive was I of Governor Badaru that when Mr. Mustapha Isah, President of the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) invited me to Jigawa as an observer to the executive meeting of the NGE two months ago, in my position as former Deputy President of the apex body for the profession of journalism in Nigeria, I readily created reasons to be excused.
Of course when the invitation to go to Jigawa came, I was somehow tempted to accept it, surely not because I had expected anything positive to come out of it, but for the simple, yet important reason that Governor Badaru had just hit the bull’s eye by appointing Malam Habibu Kila, a thoroughbred professional who personifies personal integrity, as his Special Adviser in charge of Media and Public Relations. At our biennial convention that took place in Kano in June this year, Nigerian editors had unanimously elected Habibu Kila as Vice President of the NGE in charge of Abuja and the nineteen northern states, and Kila has been to me, something of a big brother and alter-ego for three decades.
Then something terrible happened: five days ago, precisely on Sunday, November 7th instant, my 20-year old son, Yazid, died in Birnin Kudu, Jigawa State, after a brief illness. For three days from then, I was shuttling between Dutse, Jigawa capital city, and Birnin Kudu, where the boy died, until we had the third day Fidda’u prayers two days ago.
It was in the course of this shuttling that I was compelled to observe first-hand, the achievements of the incumbent governor, Badaru Abubakar, who I feared was going to be a failure.
Navigating with an old school discipline and the panache of a 21st century first-class entrepreneur, this Babura-born visionary from Babura Local Government Area of the state has simply proven that when human resolve is wedded to genuine vision, critical transformation of the human condition occurs. For Jigawa, this is what Badaru has done, putting to big shame all his detractors and doubting thomases.
Badaru came to governance after establishing himself among the most successful entrepreneurs in the history of the Nigerian nation. He was already a multi-billionaire and philanthropist-extraordinaire, and many wondered why the man thought to be richer than Jigawa could seek to be to be governor of a state that has been on the lower rungs of statutory allocation in the Nigerian federation. There was the fear that his chain of businesses, cutting across different key sectors of the Nigerian economy, were going to suffer if he was no longer available to manage them personally.
Clearly, by becoming governor, Badaru was only making a big sacrifice even at great risk to his own personal fortune and providence. That fact, incidentally, became Jigawa’s saving grace. It is what saved the state from an obvious collapse. By the time Badaru mounted the saddle in May 2015, he met a whopping N92 billion worth of inherited contractual obligations committed by the administration he took over power from. Of that amount, N65 billion was in respect of infrastructure projects largely in the roads sector with less than forty percent of progress. So terrible was the picture of things, unknown to many, that a lot of the projects had not yet even commenced. Yet the contracts have been awarded and not a dime was paid for them.
Drawing deep from his expertise in financial management, Governor Badaru moved swiftly and insightfully with the acumen of expert financial management and unprecedented prudence to complete these projects. In the process, politicians, many of them used to dipping their dirty hands in the collective patrimony of the state, named Badaru “Calculator,” because easy and free money was no longer available, and he always does the cost-benefit analyses first before awarding any contract.
As of today, all inherited road projects spanning a distance of 716 kilometers were completed by Governor Badaru. But the incredible achievement did not stop at that. The Jigawa Governor initiated and completed important road projects covering a distance of 820 kilometres.
Many Nigerians will be surprised, if not shocked, to hear that under Governor Badaru, Jigawa State has the highest road network density In Nigeria. And if you are doubting this, simply check out the fact that National Competitiveness Council of Nigeria, ranks Jigawa first in quality of roads, since its 2017 report.
Many Nigerian have continued to wonder why Jigawa, a state sharing border with Yobe and Bauchi to the volatile northeast, has remained obviously the most peaceful in Nigeria. Perhaps the answer could be seen in Governor Badaru’s novel style of one project per every village in the state. Courtesy of this style, villagers are involved in governance of the state by the governor’s style of engaging them to name three projects of importance to them. Of the three, Badaru ensures at least one is executed for the people.
By his style that ensures unprecedented prudence and accountability, Governor Badaru keeps indirectly putting money in the pockets of the people of Jigawa not only by ensuring prompt and timely payment of salaries, gratuities and other entitlements of civil servants, but also implementing policies and executing projects that benefit the people and passers-by directly. When for example you drive your car on high quality roads constructed by the Jigawa Governor, you are being saved the cost of vehicle shock absorbers, brake pads, etc, that residents of states without such privileges spend their hard-earned resources in fixing.
Ordinarily, payment of salaries of civil servants of a state can hardly be counted as an achievement for any governor. But in Nigeria, that has since become the case because many governors have to borrow to be able to pay salaries of their workers. Even when some of the governors borrow, they still misapply the resources and end up leaving their workers in the lurch.
But in the case of Governor Badaru, one will further deeply appreciate his achievements when viewed against the fact that though his state is among the lowest in terms of internally generated revenue and statutory allocation, he has not borrowed a dime to execute the key projects that have placed him among the very best in the contemporary history of the country. The Jigawa Governor only gives out a contract when he has earmarked enough money to pay for it. Badaru has also not borrowed a dime to pay salaries of workers of Jigawa State since his assumption of office. And in case you have forgotten, we are talking about one of the poorest states in the federation, at least in terms of financial resources.
Governor Badaru’s records of unpredicted achievements are such that all people of goodwill, particularly those interested in quality and accountable governance, should hail and promote, if only to encourage him to continue to do more and challenge his peers to rise up to the challenge of selfless governance, which Nigeria desperately needs to deepen its democracy and make its teeming people benefit therefrom.
•To be continued