The Governor of Kaduna State, Uba Sani can best be described as ‘God sent’ considering the impact he has made in the area of security in the North West state.
Considering what the state had passed through for close to a decade before Saniemerged as Governor, with records of killings rising every day.
The Kaduna residents indeed have cause to celebrate because they can now sleep with both eyes closed, away from what the situation was when former Governor Nasir El-rufai was in charge.
The most important aspect of it is that the Governor ceases every opportunity he gets to ensure the security and peace of the North West state.
Six months after taking the oath of office in 2023, the Governor in a bid to unite the people, stopped all forms of divisions along religious lines when he attended the ChristmasCarol organised by Kaduna State chapter of the Christina Association of Nigeria (CAN).
Recall that a few days ago, the Governor had advised well-meaning residents of KadunaState to checkmate the antics of ethnic and religious bigots, by living in peace, love and unity for overall progress and development.
According to the Governor, there can be no development without peace and harmony, He expressed happiness that everyone now lives freely without intimidation because of their tribal or religious affiliations in KadunaState.
The Governor made this known during the Christmas Carol of Six Lessons organized by the Kaduna State chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) at ECWA Good News, Narayi Highcost.
Sani, had in his remarks advised residents of the state to shun ethnic and religious antics, urging residents to live in peace, love and unity for the overall progress and development of the state.
While speaking on the tragedies that have befallen the state in the past years, he noted that the state has witnessed a series of setbacks as a result of ethnic and religious bigots who divide the state along ethno-religious lines for their selfish interests.
According to him, he attended the carol to celebrate with Christians because when he took the oath of office, he promised to treat everyone equally, irrespective of their religious, tribal, or political affiliations.
He said, “I made it clear to you when I came into power, that I am governor for everyone that lives in Kaduna, be you a Muslim or Christian or from any background, I remain your governor,’’ he added.
“Right now, we must ensure that we reduce the poverty level in our state and create jobs for our people. There are many intervention programmes that we can extend to our people.
“We’re going to work with our pastors, our religious leaders, and our community leaders. But that can only happen when we agree to continue living in peace and harmony.”
Sani used the opportunity to laud the partnership between the Jama’atuI Nasril Islam (JNI) and CAN on maintaining mutual and religious understanding in the state.
Sani added, “I can tell you that some people are not happy, but the fact remains that we took an oath, and those who are not happy may be the minority.
“The most important thing is that the majority are happy because we are working towards the development and progress of our State; for me, that is the key.”
Concerned about the state of insecurity and the urgency to address the issue, the Governor put the issue as priority when on 5th February he hosted the Elders’ Forum at the Sir Kashim Ibrahim Government House, Kaduna, the state capital.
The very influential members of the KadunaElders’ Forum who were led by the duo of Gen. Zamani Lekwot (retd) and Alhaji Abubakar Mustapha, were ostensibly at the Kaduna State Government House to felicitate with him following the affirmation of his resounding victory at the gubernatorial polls by the Supreme Court.
Governor Uba Saniused the opportunity to present what many now regard as the state-of-the-State address to the elders.
Curiously the Governor spoke largely off the cuff, underscoring his administrative depth and firm knowledge of the issues that matter.
Regarding banditry, kidnappings and other shades of insecurity and criminality in the State.
The Governor traced the root causes of the multifaceted crisis of insecurity in the State, he proffered workable solutions and gave the elders up-to-date steps his administration has so far taken, the results already achieved and the projections for the future.
Sani traced the security challenges in the State and the North-West zone of the country at large, to poverty, unemployment and poor leadership or governance at several tiers of the people’s being.
“What are the factors that have brought about this unfortunate state of affairs? Hopelessness, lack of education and lack of economic prosperity. Over 85 percent of the people in the North West are either not educated or financially excluded,” Senator Uba Sani told the elders.
“No matter how much we talk and try to bring about peace, if we don’t look at the area of good governance, we will never end the problem of insecurity in Northern Nigeria in particular.
“People always talk about how the problem of insurgency ended in the North-East, but the insurgency is not the same as the problem of banditry and kidnapping that we have in the North-West.
“The North-East issue was about people that came from nowhere and talked about the ideology of Boko Haram. However here in the North-west, there is so much poverty; and if we don’t address the poverty by supporting our farmers and increasing productivity, we will not address the problem of insecurity,” he averred.
Recall that a few weeks after assumption of office as Governor and concerned about the security situation in the state, Sani called for complete overhauling of the nation’s security architecture to overcome the security challenges facing the country and KadunaState in particular.
Sani made the call at the 6th Annual Interfaith Peace Conference which was held in Kaduna, where he stressed that security institutions must be reformed to align with global best practices.
Sani said the present (security) set up is ineffective, maintaining that unless security operations are decentralized, criminal elements will continue to constitute a threat in communities.
According to him, current and emerging security challenges require deeper thinking, planning and wide consultations to know the best approach to tackling conflicts.
He said his administration is reshaping Kaduna to make it a model of development, ethnic harmony and cooperation.
He said, “We have committed ourselves to running a pro-people, pro-poor and all inclusive administration.
“Under my watch, equity and justice shall reign supreme inKaduna state.
“Kaduna State is a miniature Nigeria. If you understand KadunaState, chances are that you will understand Nigeria with its challenges, complexities and possibilities”, the governor said.
Advertisement
Sani said the conference, with the theme, “Tackling Poverty and Insecurity in Nigeria: Our collective responsibilities” was apt.
He pointed out that poverty and insecurity are the biggest challenges facing the country.
“The increasing poverty level (in the country), is a major source of worry for political leaders.” Sani said
According to him, the issue of poverty is critical to restoring the people’s faith in the country’s democracy.
He said, “We are still struggling to address developmental challenges, especially in the areas of infrastructure, education, health, agriculture, and security.
“This is the time for all stakeholders to join hands to tackle our security and developmental challenges.
“We must however approach our problems from a position of knowledge.
“Our approach must be evidence -based. The starting point towards addressing insecurity in Nigeria is to carry out a comprehensive diagnostic review of the causes of insecurity in Nigeria.”
He stated that research has a key role to play in the search for workable solutions to the seemingly intractable challenges of insecurity.
“If you know the causes of the problem, you will be able to fashion effective immediate, short term and long term strategies towards addressing it.
“Our actions have been ad-hoc and reactive. They do not flow from research. Our compass is faulty. We must get the correct compass.
“To make progress in the area of security, we must ask the critical questions and fashion the appropriate strategies.
“How can we reset our security architecture in such a way that the proactive instead of reactive approach will be adopted in tackling insecurity in Nigeria…” he said.
“To overcome insecurity in Nigeria, there is a need for effective intelligence gathering and surveillance so that law enforcement agents can be proactive and reasonably predict potential crime with near perfect accuracy rather than being reactive.
“We must modernise the security agencies with training, intelligence sharing, advanced technology, logistics, motivation and change of orientation by security personnel.
“We must carry out a complete overhaul of our security architecture.
“Our security institutions must be reformed to align with global best practices.”
The governor declared that, “The present set up is ineffective”, stressing that, “Except security operations are decentralized, criminal elements will continue to constitute a threat in our communities.
He said, “This is why we have been agitating for state police. Nigeria is a federation. A state governor should be in effective control of security in his state.
“A situation where a Divisional Police Officer will wait for clearance from his superiors before carrying out the instructions of the Governor is unacceptable.
“There is a need for effective coordination and cooperation among and across security agencies.
“Lack of synergy for a long time weakened our efforts and strengthened criminal elements in Nigeria.
“For example, when a military operation is being carried out in one state, blocking forces are hardly stationed in neighbouring states.
“When the heat is too much, the criminal elements take refuge in neighbouring states and end up taking out their frustrations on innocent civilians.
The governor also called on the six geopolitical zones to develop common strategies and operational plans to tackle insecurity.
Governor Sani also bemoaned the huge number of out-of-school children in the North-western part of the country, especially in Kaduna State. “In Kaduna State, we have over 600,000 out-of-school children. This is unacceptable and we, in fact, view the situation as a ticking time bomb.”
The Governor was however quick to inform the elders that since assuming office, his administration has been deploying very effective measures to stem this ugly tide, an example being the proactive collaboration between the KadunaState Government and the Kuwait Fund. He said the Fund is currently supporting the State with $28million to return hundreds of out-of-school children back to school under the Qatar Sanabil Project.
The former Governor has been under fire especially after he left office because some of them believe that the former Governor has treated insecurity with levity and were quick to suspect that he was never keen on tackling the issue, especially now that the new administration of Sanihas within a few months made meaningful impact.
Some of them are of the opinion that El-rufai, apart from failing to curtail insecurity in the state also mismanaged the resources of the state, and are in full support of the probe instituted to investigate his administration.
In fact a few weeks ago, Arewa Think Tank also frowned on the action of the former governor of KadunaState, Nasir el-Rufai for taking the Kaduna State House of Assembly to Court following a probe that indicted him and his cabinet of N423 billion fraud.
The group said, “El-Rufai who did not obey court order is the person who is now running to court for protection. He demolished houses even when such cases were still in court. Take the Durbar hotel, for instance. He pulled down the structure when the case was still in court. El-Rufai refused to obey court orders and went ahead to allocate Durbar land to people who now erected buildings on the land.
“This is an irony life; the same courts whose pronouncements Nasir el-Rufai was not respecting, but he was disobeying then as the governor of KadunaState, are the same courts he is running to today to seek justice.
“Where was el-Rufai when Tinubu and Uba Sani were fighting for democracy for Nigeria to get out of the military rule. What did el-Rufai do to end insurgency and insecurity generally for the eight years he governed Kaduna,”
Speaking on the meeting of El-rufai, some northern leaders and former President Mohammadu Buahri a few months again, ATT expressed worry that previous administrations in the country could not fight banditry and insurgency for 15 years, while civil war was brought to an end within 30 months, adding those politicians did not do anything for the progress of the nation, but caused hatred among the populace.
“These politicians become audible after leaving power. Prof Yusuf and Sheikh Gumi were championing negotiation with bandits during the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari. What changed? Only the gullible will fall for their antics. The civil war lasted for 30 months, but the previous administrations could not bring banditry and insurgency to an end for over 15 years.
“They came to power when the North was in the hands of terrorists and left it in the joint hands of terrorists and bandits. The Northern poor masses should reject their political tricks and manoeuvring,” the group added.
