Politics

By Kabiru Danladi Lawanti, PhD

As the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) lifted the ban on the 2023 elections campaigns, attention has now shifted to analysing candidates’ policies and programmes. In Gombe State, like in many states, the governor seeks a second term. Governor Inuwa Yahaya of the All Progressive Congress (APC) is facing a tough battle with People’s Democratic Party’s Alhaji Jibrin Barde (Danbarde), a former banker turned politician. Danbarde was the first runner-up in the 2018 APC primary and was defeated by the incumbent Governor, Inuwa Yahaya. However, he defected to PDP in 2021, ascribing his action to bad governance in the state.

As the 2023 elections fast approach, the two leading candidates are gearing up to face each other again, not at primaries, but in the murky waters of campaigns and the general election in 2023. Already political permutations and predictions have started flowing from those in support or against the two candidates. With the reconciliation between the Governor and his erstwhile friend turned political enemy – Alhaji Danjuma Goje, many predicted that Inuwa Yahaya would have an easy sail in 2023. Coupled with incumbency and support from a political heavyweight in the state, the Governor seem to have no serious challenge going into the elections.

Things took a new turn some weeks ago when Goje appeared to have scrapped the earlier reconciliation efforts by the APC reconciliation committee weeks before the party’s National Convention. Instead, Goje remains as unpredictable as the weather in recent times. Some political pundits on conventional and social media believe Goje may support Danbarde in 2023. This was very clear when he insisted that all candidates seen as Inuwa’s supporters were to be dropped for his anointed candidates during the primaries. It took the intervention of some party stalwarts at the state and national levels to agree to allow these candidates to participate in the primaries.

However, for politicians, especially those who look to the future of who becomes Governor in 2027 in the state, support for who becomes the Governor in 2023 will be based on the odds for those contesting in 2027. For instance, since the return to democracy in 1999, Gombe state has had four governors, including the incumbent, Inuwa Yahaya. Three of these governors came from the Gombe North Senatorial District. These are Abubakar Habu Hashidu (Dukku LGA), Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo and Inuwa Yahaya (Gombe LGA). Only Danjuma Goje came from Gombe Central (Akko LGA). On the other hand, Gombe South has never produced a governor, though all the deputy governors were from that senatorial district.

Suppose the other Senatorial Districts decided to support the PDP’s Danbarde, and eventually, he becomes the Governor. In that case, it means Gombe Central and Gombe South have to wait for another eight years to have a chance to present a candidate for the number one office. This is also tricky because they may decide to support Inuwa Yahaya, with the understanding that APC may consider zoning the Governorship position to either Gombe Central or Gombe South. Can Gombe South buy this mouthwatering offer and support Inuwa? Others think that Gombe South has nothing to lose on whoever becomes the Governor in 2023, as far as the Governorship position is concerned, because they are assured of the position of Deputy Governor for any election year. It is a tradition maintained by all Governorship candidates in both parties since 1999. 

This may leave only the Gombe Central Senatorial district with a serious dilemma. Already the district’s political heavyweights have started their permutations. Most believe that supporting Danbarde means handing over the number one seat to Gombe North for 18 years. Dankwambo 8 years, Inuwa 8 years and Danbarde 8 years. Therefore, support for Inuwa Yahaya in the forthcoming elections is like a national duty if any of their sons is aiming for the Governorship seat in 2027. The two local governments that made up the senatorial district are crucial and strategic in the state’s political equation. With the state’s highest number and registered voters, they had the highest voter turn-out in the 2019 general elections.

Whatever decision the politicians and the electorates take in the forthcoming elections in 2023, they should remember that it can either make or mar their chances of producing the next Governor in 2027. Therefore, Alhaji Danjuma Goje, Alhaji Usman Bello Kumo, Abubakar Mu’azu, Barrister Idris Umar Abdullahi and other politicians from the district need to look beyond their disagreements and think ahead for the senatorial district. This may sound like another push for regional considerations, but some of these choices usually guide rational choices in politics. While no one can doubt the good performances of Inuwa Yahaya in the last four years, Gombe Central’s support for him goes beyond his perceived performance and anticipation for a more common public good. Therefore, the votes from this senatorial zone should/must be used to negotiate a power shift to the senatorial district.

This is politics.

By Ibrahim Sambo

On Tuesday, President Muhammadu Buhari commissioned the drilling of two oil wells on Kolmani OPL 809 & 810 at the Kolmani field sites in the northeastern states of Bauchi and Gombe. The two sites have about 1 billion barrels of crude oil reserves based on initial figures by the NNPC, with the potential to produce N32 trillion over 10years (at crude price of $73 per barrel).

From many angles in the North, this sparked a euphoric roar. This euphoria is quite understandable. Who would not want to have, at their disposal, tremendous quantities of the most traded commodity in the world, the mighty magical black liquid?

And even with all the green-economy and climate-smart drive by the West, the exit of the fossil fuel era is some distant away. Some months ago, the most foremost and practical evangelist of renewable energy, Elon Musk, stated in a conference in Norway that “civilization will crumble” if the world stops the use of oil and natural gas and called for continued drilling and exploration of fossil fuel sources.

Further, the concerns that the two sites where the reserves are located (Gombe and Bauchi states) are far from port terminals (at-least 700km away), hence a potential difficulty in exporting the crude oil has been laid to rest by the NNPC as they announced the plan to refine the crude oil around the oil fields by building a 120,000 barrels per day refinery. This is in addition to gas processing facilities and a power plant that could generate at least 150 megawatts (MW) of electricity.

But even with all these, there is still a great deal of pessimism as to whether we can derive the juices from the oil revenues, or we will be struck with what economists called the “resource curse”, a situation where a region has valuable natural resources but are still steeped in poverty.

A question that will linger on the mind of every discerning and concerning northerner would be, what future does this hold for the states involved, or the region, or even the country in terms of economic prosperity. A superficial answer would be that the oil and its byproducts will drive more revenue to the government for social and infrastructural development, provide employments for the youths and improve standard of living. While this is true on paper, it would not necessarily be so in practice.

For one, the resource-curse phenomenon is real. When the first oil wells in Nigeria were discovered in Oloibiri in 1958, jubilations filled the air, and it was assumed that within few years, this precious commodity will pick Nigeria up from the gutters of poverty and put her on the elitist list of wealthy nations. But 65 years down the line, Nigeria is still stuck deep in that stinking gutter. Similar thing is happening with oil-rich countries like Columbia and Venezuela for instance where they produce humongous volumes of oil but are still poor.

The second frightening thing is environmental concerns. Uncontrolled oil spill is a major threat in oil-producing areas, and a perfect example of these devastating effects we have seen in Ogoniland, where some 2.1 million barrels of oil was spilled into the land, adversely affecting their water, farming and fishing activities. Here too, this environmental fear was allayed—at-least verbally—by Gombe state governor, when he remarked during the flag-off ceremony that the region “will avoid mistake of the Niger Delta.” “With regard to the issue of the environment,” the Governor remarked, “our ministry of environment is working hand in hand with the Federal Ministry of Environment and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL) so that we will avoid all the mistakes and pitfalls that have been the big challenge of oil exploration and implementation in the southern part of the country.”

But as oil has been a curse to some, so has it been a blessing to others. Petrodollars has created immense wealth in the middle-eastern Gulf countries such as never seen in history. There is nothing that can stop northern Nigeria from doing exactly so. Oil can turn the North, and indeed Nigeria into an incredibly virile economic powerhouse.

The two northeastern states of Bauchi and Gombe will now, potentially, have a share of the 13% oil derivation fund pie. And this fund is quite huge. For starters, in just 11years, the 8 oil producing states pocketed a whopping N6trn from this fund. This share of the 13% oil derivation fund, a petroleum refinery and a gas plant, a powerplant, a fertilizer plant, all exude odor of economic merriment.

The question now is how do we make these seemingly tremendous economic potential translate into real time prosperity. The answer lies in adopting the classic model that has worked for the middle eastern countries which is great, visionary leadership.

Leadership—and not an abundance of resources, is the foundation upon which prosperity lies upon, as we have seen time and again. It is that simple. Without good leadership, a society has zero chance of prosperity even if bars of gold gushes down the gutters of its towns and cities.

When Sheikh Muhammed Al-Makhtoum put a tiny desert nation, the UAE, on to the world map, it was through sheer vision and strategic implementation. The North needs to have Al-Makhtoums who would properly manage the money gotten from this venture and channel into well-crafted visions of development; of erecting technology infrastructures for a digital economy, of building mega industries that provide jobs, of constructing roads and state-of-the-art health facilities, of building modern schools and laboratories, of building structures for hospitality and tourism, and all the things that make for a modern economy. The money will be there and in abundance.

As the first oil drill takes place in the Northern region, can we get into power the leaders who would properly use the money from this venture into longterm projects that will finally liberate the North from extreme poverty that has so much traumatize us, and turn it to a modern economy, full of wealth and possibilities and opportunities, or are we leaving the money to go down the wire, into the pocket of the privileged few elites, just like our southern brothers, and just be bragging that we are now oil producing entities, with nothing to show? It is now left to us. In the words of the Hausa man, dabara ya rage wa mai shiga rijiya.

Ibrahim Sambo writes from Lagos. He can be reached at ibrahymsambo4@gmail.com

By Ahmad Deedat Zakari

President Muhammadu Buhari has unveiled the redesigned naira notes in Abuja.

The President unveiled the new naira notes on Wednesday morning at the meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC ) at the state house, Abuja.

The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele was also in attendance during the unveiling ceremony.

While addressing the FEC members after the unveiling ceremony, the CBN governor debunked the rumours that the early unveiling of new notes is a means to target any Nigerian.

He therefore appealed to the public to refrain from perpetuating such rumours.

He added that the CBN will intensify the monitoring process and interrogate the process of withdrawals.

He stated that there will be strict restriction on the volume of cash that people can withdraw over the counter, as it works with the EFCC to monitor the purpose of any heavy transactions.

Ahmad Deedat Zakari

President Muhammadu Buhari said the Kolmani oil project has attracted over $3bn investment in the oil and gas sector at a time the world is unwilling to invest in fossil energy.

The President made the disclosure while flagging off the Kolmani Development Project in Bauchi on Tuesday. The president noted that his administration has done everything to de-risk the project and attract investors.

Buhari said:

“Considering the land locked location and the huge capital requirement, the economics of the project is a challenging proposition. Consequently, from the outset, I instructed NNPC Limited to utilize and leverage their vast asset portfolio across all corridors of its operations to de-risk the project to attract the much-needed investment.”

“It is therefore to the credit of this administration that at a time when there is near zero appetite for investment in fossil energy, coupled with the location challenges, we are able to attract investment of over USD 3 billion to this project.”

The President in his address also commended the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) for their effort in discovering oil in the northern part of the country after so many futile attempts. He noted that the discovery foreshadows economic prosperity for Nigeria.

“This is indeed significant considering that, efforts to find commercial oil and gas outside the established Niger Delta Basin was attempted for many years without the desired outcomes,” he stated.

The Daily Reality had reported that the Kolmani oil exploration is the first of its kind in Northern Nigeria.

By Ahmad Deedat Zakari

President Muhammadu Buhari is all set to flag off the exploration of oil exploration in Gombe and Bauchi states. The historic event is the first of its kind in the northern part of the country.

Amidst very tight security, the president and his entourage arrived in Bauchi on Tuesday, 22nd November, 2022 for the ground- breaking ceremony and inauguration of the first oil drilling in Northern Nigeria.

The ceremony is set to take place at the OPLs 809 and 810 sites in Kolmani, a border community between Bauchi and Gombe State.

The Nigerian National Petroleum Company, NNPC, had announced the discovery of oil in commercial volume in October 2019. Crude oil, gas were said to be discovered in the Kolmani River region at the community between Bauchi and Gombe State.

By Muhammadu Sabiu

After conducting a survey in which the decision was barely supported by users, Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk announced that Donald Trump’s account had had the ban placed on it lifted.

Elon Musk set up a poll on the site on Saturday, asking users if they thought the former president should be permitted back onto the app.

A sizable majority of 52% of the more than 15 million users who took part in the poll voted to reinstall the former US president.

“The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated,” Musk tweeted of the former US president’s account, which was banned last year after a mob of his supporters attacked the US Capitol.

By Ahmad Deedat Zakari

Things appear to be continuously falling apart in the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, as the party has been unable to resolve its internal crisis.

Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State had on Thursday subtly endorsed the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi. This has inarguably caused more division in the party.

Governor Wike while playing host to the Labour Party presidential candidate and his running mate, Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed in Porthacourt on Thursday, pledged logistics supports for Peter Obi’s campaign.

“Each time you want to campaign in the state, let me know, all the logistics support, we will give to you,” Wike told Obi to the cheers of Obi’s supporters.

Wike who is strong stalwart of the PDP, had fallen out with the presidential candidate of the party, Atiku Abubakar, after he lost the party’s primary election to the latter in May this year.

Three months to the 2023 general election, Wike and four other PDP governors are requesting for the resignation of the party’s national hairman, Iyorchia Ayu. They were reported to have said they will not support Atiku Abubakar if their request is not granted. Unfortunately, neither the party chairman nor the presidential candidate is ready to accede to their demands.

Wike and his allies had argued that it is against equity to have the presidential candidate of the party and the national chairman of the party from northern part of the country.

By Yakubu Nasiru Khalid

If Atiku Abubakar can be trusted, why did he contest the presidential election five times and not win?

Atiku is the most frequent presidential candidate in Nigeria. He started contesting for a presidential position in 1991 under several parties, including the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). However, he has consistently failed all the time. 

Also, General Muhammad Buhari, the current president, contested for the presidential position from 2003-2015 and failed three times.

Eng. Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso is the second presidential wannabe who contested the presidential primaries election. He has never stood for an election at the national level. Standing election at the national level is a lot.

Note: Whoever blindly and persistently needs to take a particular post in politics should not be voted because he only needs the immunity, favour, or title needs to prefix on their name, not the country’s property. Nigeria will only remain poor and unstable If Atiku wins.

Eyes measurement is enough for a wise; all those presidential contestants are on the same boat as Buhari. They are only dying to prefix the title of president to their names, not to lead Nigeria to the ever brighter state.

There are two major popular political parties in the South All Progress Congress APC and People’s Democratic Party PDP. However, the New Nigerian People’s Party NNPP is rare because it has few supporters.

This means the South’s votes are shared among two parties, PDP and APC, and Asuwaju Bola Ahmad Tinubu dominates almost all southern States. Therefore, Atiku will get fewer votes from southern Nigeria. This means Asuwaju Bola Ahmad has 63% of the votes, Atiku has 37% votes, and 10% will be shared amongst the rest parties. 

In the North, three political parties are populous, each with a large number of supporters. Atiku and Kwankwaso are northerners, and Bola Ahmad is from the South and the ruling party, APC. Kano is the largest state in the North that produces high votes, and each party will eat into the other. This means none has the majority. So they will be vulnerable to each other. Lagos’s votes are automatic belong to Asuwaju Bola Ahmad Tinubu.

Casting votes for PDP or NNPP is a waste. So, vote wisely for the solution for humanity. Nigeria needs a fresh, diligent and experienced leader. Age or educational status doesn’t matter a lot. Vote for someone who optimistically thinks Nigeria will be economically strong with a political cloud. 

Yakubu Nasiru Khalid wrote via yakubunasirukhalid@gmail.com.

By Aisar Fagge

Kano State Deputy Governor and All Progressives Congress (APC) gubernatorial candidate, Dr Nasiru Yusuf Gawuna said no serious government will succeed without the contributions of Civil Society Organizations (CSO’s) and Non-Governmental organizations (NGO’s).

Gawuna made this statement on Monday, 14th November, 2022 during a continuation of interactive session series organised by a coalition of 21 Kano CSO’s and NGO’s aiming to promote peace and development of Kano State.

Gawuna said, “We are not enemies of NGO’s. That’s why we are here. We’ll work together with NGO’s and CSO’S especially on the issues concerning education, youth and women.

“In many places, government alone cannot do all it’s work. They need the intervention of NGO’s. I have seen one person in Kenya teaching the whole school. We too here are going to involve NGO’s in improvising classrooms to cater the needs of our school pupils,” he stressed.

“I urge you journalists, NGO’s and CSO’s to to enlighten people about the activities of government and its programmes,” Gawuna appealed.

Other issues the APC candidate discussed were his development agenda on employment, health, education, agriculture, infrastructure, climate change, etc.

Convened by Dr Aminu Magashi Garba, the sessions allowed the gubernatorial candidates to interact with members of NGO’s, CSO’s, media practitioners and community leaders and share their blueprints on critical areas such health, education, youths, women, environment, commerce, agriculture, technology among others.

The event that commences on 9th November was graced by gubernatorial candidates of People’s Redemption Party (PRP), Salihu Tanko Yakasai; Bala Muhammad Gwagwarwa of Social Democratic Party (SDP), Mal. Ibrahim Khalil of African Democratic Congress (ADC); Engr. Bashir I. Bashir of Labour Party (LP) and Sha’aban Ibrahim Sharada of Action Democratic Party (ADP). Participants were hoping to see Abba Kabir Yusuf of New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) and Sadiq Wali of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the subsequent meetings.

By
Ahmad Deedat Zakari

The National Broadcasting Commission, NBC, has imposed N2 million sanction on Arise TV for broadcasting fake news.

NBC Director-General, Balarabe Shehu Helah, disclosed this in a statement on Monday.

The Director-General described the action of Arise TV as an unfortunate breach of the Nigerian Broadcasting Code, grossly unprofessional and insensitive.

“This is the most unfortunate breach of the Nigerian Broadcasting Code and gross display of unprofessionalism and insensitivity by your organization at this time of electioneering,” he said.

The Director-General argued that Nigeria’s extant laws on broadcasting clearly prohibited fake news. He added that the NBC has taken its time to enlighten broadcasters on the provisions of the Nigerian Broadcasting Code and the Electoral Act as the 2023 General election approaches.

Consequent of the breach, the NBC sanctioned Arise TV and requested they pay the sum of N2 million naira with two weeks.

“Consequently, pursuant to Section 5.1. 3 of the Nigerian Broadcasting Code, Arise TV is hereby sanctioned and shall pay a penalty of 2, 000, 000.00 ( Two Million Naira only) Note that the penalty shall be paid within two weeks of the receipt of this letter or sanction shall be graduated,” the statement reads.

Arise TV maliciously reported that the Presidential Candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Bola Ahmad Tinubu is under investigation by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, of alleged forfeiture in a US Court. Arise TV had admitted their guilt and apologized to the party and person involved.