Kastina State governor, Aminu Masari agrees that the issue of rampaging herdsmen deserves attention but warns against bringing religious and tribal coloration into it. He spoke with Iyobosa Uwugiaren and Bolaji Adebiyi. Excerpts:
‎Are you worried about the activities of Fulani cattle herdsmen?
You need to tell me who are the cattle herdsmen. Are they not the same people whose activities we have been able to control in states like Kastina, Zamfara and Kano? The fact of the matter is that we have to accept we are Nigerians. How can we accommodate one another? If I say I cannot accommodate you because you are from Borno State, there is a problem because this is somebody you cannot drive away from the country. In some areas, it is not about herdsmen; some of the problems are historical. Take states like Kaduna and Plateau, it is not a fight between Fulani and farmers. We need to address some of these issues; we cannot live on bad history; we need to rise above it and build our future. Of course, some politicians who lost out may want to fuel the crisis. We need to be very careful because the issue is taking certain coloration- as if some groups are trying to decimate or disorganise some parts of the country and some people are buying into it. They are bringing in religious and tribal colorations instead of seeing the problem for what it is.
What have you done in the past two years in fulfilment of your campaign promises to the people of Kastina State?
We predicated our campaign promises on five issues: education, water, agriculture, health and security. More importantly, the issue of security was very dear to me because without security you cannot execute other projects. When we came on board we met huge problems on ground. Though, we were aware of the problems before we came, but we were not really aware of the level of the problems. We immediately set up an education committee with a responsibility to look at the foundational education, that is, visiting all the primary schools in all local government areas of the state. The committee visited 22,272 primary schools across the state it also visited 387 junior secondary schools. It eventually gave us a conditional report of the schools, which showed that over 70 per cent of the classrooms at primary level were virtually no longer what you can call classes. The remaining 30 per cent, can be made habitable with minor repairs. We have a population of over 1.7 million students but we don’t have sitting arrangement for up to 200,000. It was a terrible situation- the sitting arrangement was for insignificant number of about 140,000. Others were sitting on the floor. Again, we have shortages of over 3262 classrooms at primary school level. This was just at the primary school level. We also discovered that 60 per cent of the teaching staff members had the essential qualification to be teachers but lacked the knowledge, because they have not been given refresher courses, they were not attending any training either organised by the ministry of education or the primary education board. So, the morale was very low, had gone down completely. After reviewing this pitiable situation, we discovered that we needed about 15,000 additional teachers in our primary schools in areas like English Language, mathematics, sciences, arts and religious studies. We discovered that for all these, what we had was not more than 6000 plus. So the primary school system needed about 9000 teachers to have a ratio in accordance with standards. We also needed about 3,262 additional classes to house 50 students per class; we also discovered that in order to fix education, restore the infrastructure, provide more classrooms, train teachers and provide other facilities, we needed billions of naira to fix it. For instance, in a school of about 800 populations, we had just three teachers including the headmaster. In some schools, where you have a classroom that can accommodate 79 pupils, the population was over 150 pupils. For those schools that were still standing, it is either the windows had been broken or the rooms were inhabitable. I visited a major primary school in the centre of Katsina that trained most of the elites you see from Katsina local government, it has a population of 6,700 and it has about 40 classrooms and none of the classroom has chairs nor desks; none of the classroom has a floor, all the floors were gone. The headmaster said they were housing an average of 160 to 180 per classroom that should take 50. I also visited Hadis Secondary School that also produced many of the elites here in Katsina, I went to a class, JSS3. I asked for the number of people in the class. They said 167 in a classroom. Not convinced, I said let’s take a headcount, we counted 109. Supposed the others were present, about 58, where were they going to sit? Those who were sitting on the floor were putting their books on their laps. To begin to address the problems, we decided to restore the structures of the entire education in the state. We have constructed over 300 classrooms; renovated many schools with good laboratory facilities; we are changing the roofing of the schools completely; reinforcing the windows. By December last year, we have renovated 784 primary schools and constructed over 300 primary schools. We have transferred over 700 workers in local government with the required qualifications to teach in primary schools; and they are being provided with the necessary training. We have also moved to higher institutions. This is necessary because many elites in the north acquired their education here in Kastina.
Recently, you organised an economy summit in your state that attracted top business investors from within and outside the country. The whole idea was to attract them to invest in Kastina State. Have you started seeing the positive result?
Definitely, we have started seeing the result. In the areas of housing, people have started to invest; in agriculture, groups like Dangote and others have shown interest; a Turkish company has also shown interest. We are going to develop an industrial park, and within the next two years, we will have the highest production of solar power in Kastina. The first company has reached about 70 per cent completion while the second has reached about 60 per cent. We are placing more emphasis on agriculture because the revenue goes to the people directly; agriculture does not pollute the environment. This is the way to go. We are really seeing positive signs from the economy summit.
Could you share with us the burden of being a governor in a state the president hails from?
Well, people expect so much from us, especially when 80 per cent of the people within the inner circle are also from the Aso Rock Villa – the presidency. We are trying to find ways to manage and see how we can leave with it. As for President Muhammadu Buahri, he has never put pressure on me; he has never demanded for employment or appointment or interfered with the selection of our projects in our state.
As a former speaker of the House of Reps, what is the difference between being in the legislature and being in the executive?
To be a national legislator is a wonderful thing; especially if you are the presiding officer. It is the most difficult job because you are presiding in an assembly of equal members. It becomes more difficult if you are presiding in the House, where members are politicians on the move- some members want to be senators, governors and something ease, unlike the Senate where many of the politicians there are retirees. So, managing the House’s members is more difficult than the Senate. We worked during difficult time when I was the presiding officer. We worked with former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who does not believe in living in peace; except peace defines by him. But it also helped in keeping us on our toes; because, Obasanjo would call you at 3am and start making trouble; that is Obasanjo’s nature. In terms of freedom, the National Assembly gives you more freedom. But many members of your constituency do not understand that senators or members if the House don’t have the budget to build schools, hospitals and other social amenities. Apart from that, it gives you a huge opportunity to meet people from different parts of the country. To be a governor, you face all kinds of pressure. You can do many things within the limit of resources available to you, as a governor. It enables you to touch the lives of many people, especially if you use your position for the benefit of the people.
The Peoples Democratic Party is of the opinion that your party has failed the people. What is your take on that?
It is like somebody who destroyed this house and brought it down completely and suddenly, people realise that you need to rebuild it only to discover that that there is a shortage of resources and the shortage was caused by the people who destroyed the house. It is unfortunate that we have a short memory. We and members of PDP know the damage the party has done to our country economically, socially and otherwise. They know the damage they did to our country. So, people should not expect us to correct the damage they did in 16 years in less than two years. Of course, PDP is now an opposition party; in Nigeria opposing is the simplest thing to do. But when it was in power, crude oil was selling for more than 100 US Dollar per barrel. The country was producing 2.2 million barrels per day. That was the time the country was getting more revenue; it was more than enough. Instead of even leaving the revenue for excess crude account, they finished it; wherever, there was money, they finished it. When we came there was insurgency in the North-east, which they could not control. In fact they promoted insurgency. In spite of the fact that there were not enough resources, we were able to bring peace and security to the region. Now, they can travel from Borno State to Badagry, from Ikot to Sokoto without fear of being attacked. When we came on board, two state governors- Borno and Yobe, had relocated to Abuja. Two states were virtually taken over by insurgents; they removed Nigerian flag and replaced it with theirs in virtually all the local government areas of the two states, as if it was another country. That was the situation we met on ground. But within one year, peace returned to those states; at least, the insurgents were decapitated. We reequipped our military to fight the insurgents; we boosted their morale. PDP was a total failure, it destroyed this country. What do they expect us to do when they finished the resources of this country? We have been able to manage the resources at our disposal and used them for the benefit of the people in the past two years. PDP couldn’t achieve in five years what we have done in two years. Before we came in, the cattle rustlers were killing people here in Kastina State forcing some village heads to relocate to other areas for safety. In some places, the cattle rustlers sacked the entire villages. But today, peace has returned to those villages; we are currently constructing roads to those villages. They can say what they like because they were defeated.
How would you rate President Muhammadu Buhari in the past two years? Are you proud of what he has done?
Of course; I am very proud of him and proud of what he has done. When we came 27 states were not paying salaries. The president came up with bailout. States were given money to pay salaries; those owing pension and gratuities were given money to pay and my state benefited from that gesture. Each state was also given N10 billion from excess crude account for infrastructure. When the oil price went down and many states could not pay salaries, again, Buhari introduced what he called budget support. For the first four months, each state was given N1.4 billion and there were many other interventions from the federal government in order to help stabilise the states. I wonder what would have happened if there were no interventions from the federal government. If we have not had Buhari we would have been in serious crisis with the way former President Goodluck Jonathan and his people messed up the economic, the politics and the entire country. Today, there is a relative peace in the country. We are able to meet the minimum obligation of paying salaries, gratuities and pension.
From what you are saying it appears many of the states are not viable?
It is not about viability; it is about poor management of financial resources. We have systematically overloaded the system. We have brought in unnecessary politics in the administration of local government system. The purpose of local government system was destroyed by the previous government so much so that the local government councils can no longer perform their functions. We have overloaded the employment in local government. This has is put so much pressure on the state government. We missed the point when we assume that government must give everybody job. What about education and other social amenities?
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The purpose of local government system was destroyed by the previous government so much so that the local government councils can no longer perform their functions.
