Buhari, El-Rufai missing when we fought for democracy – Lamido

* Forget NGF crisis, when it comes to money govs ‘re united

Governor Sule Lamido is arguably the most socialist inclined of the country’s 36 governors. In his six years in office as governor of Jigawa State, he has in several ways sought to give the imprint of the Talakawa ideology he inherited from his one time leader, Mallam Aminu Kano on the state. Such policies as the allocation of slots to women and the physically disabled at all levels of government, subsidy on quality medicare and education, and the frantic effort to extend infrastructure to reach the lowest cadre of the citizenry are glimpses of Governor Lamido’s socialist inclinations on ground in Jigawa State.

Following the Sallah Durbar marking the end of the Islamic month of Ramadan, the governor sat down for a brief interview touching on the recent effort by him and four other governors to mobilise some of the country’s elder-statesmen to intervene in the crisis in the polity. Of course, he spoke on the conspiracy of the elite class against the Nigerian masses. Excerpts:

BY EMMANUEL AZIKEN, POLITICAL EDITOR

What do you intend to achieve with your visits to the past leaders?
We are people who are normal human beings who are concerned about their country, who believe in their country regardless of which party they come from. If we are going to have democracy, democracy has rules therefore we should learn to uphold those tenets of democracy. If you manipulate it you are rocking the entire system. It is not against anybody’s aspirations, we are not against anybody. But we are being maligned, we are now being called a gang of five, we are now being called desperadoes. See how we are being maligned.

But if you look at us, these are people who stuck out their necks for this country two years ago, all of us! It is because we have the capacity to understand where we are going that is why we have the courage to stand up and say. It has nothing to do with this so called aspiration for 2015 at all, it is about the way things are being done within the system, the way the government is being run. It doesn’t matter if it is my own government or any other one in the country, the way the institutions are being run, the way the parties are being run, do they really conform with the rules of democracy? A situation where a hired hand like Doyin Okupe, a wage earner speaks only to justify his pay will malign me that I am irrelevant.

Justifying the wages
He became an aide after the election. These people who are now talking and abusing us are personal aides who became what they are when the mandate was achieved. They were nowhere when the whole thing was being worked out. It means there was an election before they were able to serve as personal aides. In their own case, it is an industry, they are justifying the wages they are earning, it is for the pay. There is nothing like honour in that because they are just hired hands if tomorrow you have another president they go to him.

All of them are so irrelevant in their own constituencies, they have no idea what we went through. Our worry is the institution, ignore our personalities, ignore Sule Lamido, he may be an irritant it doesn’t matter, you can abuse my person but don’t abuse the office l am holding because the office is symbolic. If you demystify the office, if appointees of the president would be that audacious to organise people to pellet us with stones unwittingly they are also disrobing the Office of the President because he is also our symbol.

You can abuse Sule Lamido, you can abuse Kwankwaso, you can abuse Wamakko but don’t abuse our office because after I leave office as governor of Jigawa State, this institution will remain. If appointees of the president would insult us simply because they are justifying the pay that they are earning, because they are there for the pay. They are wage earners, they are not stakeholders.

Two, we are going round not because of any personal interest or because we have an ambition, we are going round because we feel that no matter what, a democracy must have some pattern, some standard. It must have clearly defined rules and when the rules are depressed to obtain an advantage, you are also depressing the country. How can we as governors unite and pick our own leader, clearly, our own chairman, nobody else’s. You know in the Governors Forum we don’t discuss politics, it is all about the economy.

Are you not bothered that the real agenda of the Governors Forum is being lost?
No, no. The Governors Forum is an informal thing, nothing like an agenda.

What I mean is your coming together to articulate common issues?
My friend if tomorrow the issue is about sharing money, the governors of Akwa Ibom, that of Lagos, that of Zamfara, Bayelsa will be on the same frequency because they all want money. In fact, Bayelsa and Akwa Ibom need more money because they have got very difficult terrain. So, the issue is not about persons, but it is about what do we get as governors from the federation account which is defined as ours. That is all. Today, the Federal Government is the custodian, minister of finance controls the money and for us to take from the money we have to go and beg and beg and beg.

Get me very clear, when the issue is about the economy, about getting money from the federation account, all the governors in Nigeria are on the same frequency. All the governors are on the same wavelength whether it is Jang or Fashola or Giedam or Suswam or Sule Lamido, all of us, when it is about getting money to your state, we are on the same frequency. That is all. So, let us have institutions which are functioning. Clearly defined and when they are functioning you wont talk about problems in Nigeria for the next one million years. Not Nigeria of today and when a country is not defined by institutions we will keep on remaining in one spot.

So when it is said that Nigeria cannot break, yes it is too weak to be broken. It is too weak to break. Who will break it? The ordinary person in Jigawa or the ordinary person in Sokoto or the ordinary person in Bayelsa? Is it the Ibo vulcaniser or the Yoruba woman who is selling kerosene by the roadside or the Okada man in Delta? They don’t have the capacity to unite because they are burdened by poverty.