On July 15th, 2014 a revolution
took place in Yola, the Adamawa state capital courtesy of the state’s
legislators. Sadly, the revolution was
truncated eighty-six days later by forces who felt threatened by the success
recorded within this short period of time.
This period can be likened to an era of enlightenment for a people and a
state long held hostage by a few self-serving individuals whose concept of
governance is not beyond the subjugation of the people, self-aggrandisement and
self-glorification through recourse to ethno-religious divide and the pillage
of state resources. These people have no
sense of rights or responsibilities – their responsibilities begin and end with
their immediate families and cronies.
While a whole state suffers and stutters, they rejoice and swim amidst
ill-gotten wealth; the tears of the poor are the oil for their seamy lives.
On this day, a relatively unknown quantity
(unknown by their weird standards) ascended the seat of the governor of the
state by providence and thereby “distorted” a succession plan laid before the
impeachment. Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri, the
Speaker of the Adamawa State House of Assembly was never in the loop as far as
the powers that be are concerned and was considered an interloper by the
mandarins holding the jugular of Adamawa State.
On taking the oath of office, he hit the ground literally running. He tinkered with the administration of the
civil service, lighted up a fourteen kilometre stretch of road which was
earlier awarded at a cost that was 200% the cost at which Fintiri awarded,
completed, equipped and commissioned hospitals in Numan and Jada and paid the
civil servants their salaries withheld since 2011 for sadistic reasons.
In the short time that he spent holding the
reins of governance in the state, he succeeded in restoring hope to a people
who has given up on government and politics.
He has shown that government can work when there is the will and the commitment. After taking over from a government that has
all but killed the civil service, he revitalised the civil service and made it
the fulcrum of administration and the arrowhead of his rescue mission. He embarks on projects that are people-oriented. The sum of it all is that Fintiri demystified
the myth that government cannot work or be sensitive to the needs of the
people. That governance is no rocket science. All it takes to run a successful government
is the commitment, sincerity of purpose and the fear of God. These actions, small as they may appear,
scared those whose stock in trade has always been deception.
The campaigns of calumny began on all fronts
with a single aim – bring down Fintiri before he disrobes us. With a gullible audience, a malleable
judiciary and a conniving presidency, they succeeded in bringing his government
to an end. But did they succeed in
bringing him down? I don’t think so.
The campaign was so childish, insensitive
and beggars believe with the calibre of those involved in the whole mess. Unsavoury comments were attributed to him in
an effort to demonise him and make him a hated figure. Comments like “I have broken the calabash of
the Fulani’s”, “my mother is a Christian and therefore I will convert to Christianity
once I am elected to the office of the governor of Adamawa State”, and many
more crazy things. After the court
terminated his acting tenure, allegations of stealing N18billion was bandied
around the cyber world by people I thought were too “educated” to believe, let
alone circulate such crap.
After sifting the multitude of allegations,
those I mentioned above appear to me the most mundane among them. They also diminished our status, in my
opinion. Assuming Fintiri’s mother is a Christian
(which she is not) how does that disqualify him from being the governor of the
state. Am I to infer from this mindless
allegation that Christians are precluded from ascending the governorship
position in Adamawa State? When has it
been criminalised to practice one’s choice of religion and practice it free
from any discrimination? Was the
constitution of the federal republic amended to expunge the section
guaranteeing the freedom of worship? The
allegation of stealing N18billion in eighty-six days is the most idiotic of
all. Before making assholes (excuse the
language), why don’t we use our common sense (I agree it is not common) to make
some informed comments? Did we care to
find out how much accrued to the state within the period Fintiri was holding
fort? I believe with the Freedom of
Information Act (FOA) one can easily get the details of all financial in-flows
to any state government in the country. To
go ahead and make such wild allegations is the height of irresponsibility in my
book.
The investigations conducted by the Fintiri
led administration, with the assistance of consultants, on the state of the
government’s finances and its relationship with its bankers, opened a can of
worms and provided a bird’s eye view on how the impeached government in
collaboration with its bankers have been milking the state dry. While the state was wilting and dying inch by
inch, they were living fat off its skeleton.
The financial recklessness unearthed by the consultants has no reference
in the history of financial administration in the state’s chequered
history. A whopping sum of N72billion
has been systematically stolen while an overdraft of another N12billion was
serviced every month to the tune of over N1billion. Instead of explaining how N72billion was frittered
away, they resorted to painting Fintiri with the same brush they painted
themselves in the hope of obfuscating their crimes.
I feel ashamed that people that I know and
count among my associates could descent to this level just to remain “relevant”
or attempt to destroy someone else’s career simply because he refused to be
identified with any “godfather” and choose to hold on to his God as his
“Godfather”. Have we so lost our sense
of propriety to the extent that we are willing to tell lies against others and
invite the wrath of God on us for a pot of porridge? I have mixed emotions for this crowd at the
moment – are they to be shunned or pitied?
Fintiri’s tenure as acting governor was
brought down – yes; his ambition to contest for the residual tenure of Nyako
was shot down by the enemies of the state – yes; but was he brought down? No. it
is our collective lost. I pitied the
people of Adamawa, who were the primary beneficiaries of the policies and
programmes designed to be implemented by Fintiri. The beginnings of a template on good
governance was about to manifest, when the forces of darkness struck but I
believe it may not be easy for anyone to deviate substantially from the path
charted by Fintiri without inviting the wrath of the poor. Kan
mage ya waye.
