…Says ‘terrorists can be defeated if…’
….Discusses massive infrastructure achievements
…Reveals how state IGR moved from N90m to over N5b in 30 months
His six-point agenda makes some sense. But what he said he met when he assumed office did not:
“The worst thing was that we met an empty treasury.
When I tell people that there was only N4 million in the government account, people are always like, how is that possible?”
That was not all (read details in the interview). He promised to focus on SECURITY, AGRICULTURE AND FOOD SECURITY, EDUCATION, HEALTHCARE, ECONOMY and EMPOWERMENT. He has kept his promise. For instance, he has already moved the Internally Generated Revenue, IGR, of the state from a meagre N90 million monthly, to over 5 Billion within just 30 months. However, the insecurity that Zamfara State is known for is what gives Governor Dauda Lawal concern; not so much because it can not be dealt with, but because those who should act have created a deafening and dumbfounding stasis of unimaginable quantum, thereby allowing the disgusting optics which suggests that the terrorists are undefeatable.
When the quintet of Jide Ajani, Onochie Anibeze, Charles Kumolu, Soni Daniel and Jeremiah Urowayino met the governor in Abuja, he came across as blunt and unassuming. For a banker turned politician, he has his work cut out.
Excerpts:
Governance: What did it feel like when you took over?
I inherited a very, very serious and dysfunctional state in Zamfara, whereby we had to start from a deeper foundation, not even the surface, because we had to go deeper to be able to come out to where we are today. My first major challenge, of course, was the insecurity in the state.
It went on for about 10 years or so. Whenever you heard about Zamfara, it was always about killings, this and that and so on. Everything was negative. We had a backlog of salaries at the time that were not paid. Even though the minimum wage in Zamfara then was N7,000, they couldn’t pay the salaries for four months. That was my first major issue to deal with.
Second, for five good months, there was not a single drop of water in the state capital, Gusau, because there was no money to pay for the chemicals needed for water treatment. And they couldn’t buy diesel, because there was no money to power the generators to be able to pump water. Not to talk of education where, for good two years, our students could not write, WAEC and NECO, and so many other factors.
Healthcare was at the lowest level. Education, generally, there was a crisis everywhere. Students were sent to different places, both within and outside the country. They couldn’t pay for the scholarship.
We had students in India, Cyprus, Sudan, name it, talk less of within the country. The worst thing was that we met an empty treasury. When I tell people that there was only N4 million in the government account, people are always like, how is that possible? Yes, how is that possible? N4 Million? It is possible because facts don’t lie, and I still challenge anybody to show me where there was any money at the time. I can give you the account statement of what I met. It’s that simple. We are not exaggerating. They were supposed to pay M7,000 as minimum wage, yet they couldn’t pay. The minimum wage was N7,000, and we had a fourmonth backlog at the time. Not to talk about pensions and other things. Not to talk about infrastructure. If we show you the before and after pictures of Gusau as a city, as a capital of Zamfara State, honestly, it’s an eyesore.
You cannot move 200 metres on a good road in Gusau, talk less of other 14 local government areas in the state. Whenever it rained, everywhere was flooded, it was unbelievable. Now, another major thing was, because they couldn’t settle their electricity bill, KEDCO disconnected every government office, including Government House. There was no electricity.
This guy, when he was leaving, he packed all the official vehicles, everything, not a single car to use. If not for my own vehicles, I wonder what we would have done. I provided for myself, my wife, the deputy governor, his wife, and everyone else. For good six months, I was running the state from my pocket because there was nothing.
When you were coming in, you had an idea that things were not really working well, so you wanted to change it. But what you saw must have blown your mind beyond imagination…
Honestly, we were just looking at the surface at the time, because you need to go deeper to understand the extent of the damage. It’s not something you will know from outside. Until when you’re within the system, that is when you truly understand the extent of the crisis within the state. So you can imagine that you are given just a state like that. Where do you even start from? What do you do? How do you come out of it? With the rate of insecurity at the time, a day never passes by without hearing that 100 people, 50 people, were being killed just like that for no reason. That was Zamfara State at the time, and even the debt profile was so high.
As we speak now, on a monthly basis, there is a direct deduction of a minimum N1.2 billion from the FAC allocation – and that’s of the previous debt. It was N1.5 billion when we started. But it has reduced because we didn’t borrow a dime up till today.
You have not borrowed anything?
No, I have not borrowed a dime.
How’s that possible?
When people go to Zamfara and they see what is happening now, even my colleagues, they always ask me, oh, you’re using your resources. I say, well, it’s good, at least I have resources I can use for the benefit of mankind.
We met a dysfunctional system. I inherited 48 commissioners, 52 permanent secretaries. Then the pension. For 13 years, since 2011, they have not paid a dime. Meanwhile, even when they exite from PENCOM, we saw where the money was transferred to Zamfara State government, and they just took the money. As an ex-banker, you can always trace where the money is. All these things were tabled before every anti-corruption agency, letting them know what was happening. There was no feedback. Nothing about it. It’s just for record purposes. I wasn’t expecting anything to come out of it anyway, but for the record, this is what we met. Someday, somewhere, somehow, somebody will look at those records. It doesn’t matter how long it takes.
But what did you do in terms of dealing with the morass? How did you prioritize?
The first thing was to say let us clear the backlog of the salaries. Then it was about three billion Naira. So we cleared that. Then we began to put certain major things in place. For the KEDCO, you know what, I told them, I can’t pay you, so let’s sit down and agree on the payment details, I mean, terms. We did that, and then they connected us back to the national grid to be able to function. And, of course, the water issue, within five days, we were able to solve that. I had to use some of my contacts to call some people to get even the machine, because all the machines that were supposed to be pumping water were dead.
The little money we had, we said, okay, let’s fix the generators, let’s buy chemicals. I had to speak to someone and say, can you give us a three-month supply, when we have money, we’ll pay you? But for sure, we would structure something for you on a monthly basis until we find our bearing. We were able to do all that.
The IGR issue, how were you able to do that? From N90m monthly IGR to over N4 billion?
IGR is a function of leakages because there wasn’t any system to check who was doing what and how. So I said, look, you’re not going to continue. For us to be independent, we should be able to generate enough money to pay for our salaries. How did we do it? I had to bring some of my friends that I know have absolute confidence that they will be able to deliver on whatever we set out to do. There was so much noise about me bringing foreigners. I said, look, these foreigners are not commissioners, but advisers. And the constitution has given me the right to bring anybody, not even within the country, even outside the country, to advise me as the governor of the state. There’s nothing anybody can do.
I also had to rationalise all the ministries. So I said, you know what, even the federal government does not have 52 permanent secretaries. So we had 22 not have 52 permanent secretaries. So we had 22. But when they began to retire, I said, look, I’ll get to that level where I know I’ll be comfortable. Even the merger was a major issue. Oh, ‘he’s trying to send people away’. I said I was not sending anybody away, I was just trying to see how we could have a working system that is functional.
From the resistance to change, when you first came in and the policies that were put in place, what is the reaction of the people today?
You know, the most difficult thing is changing the mindset of people. Remember, it’s a state that is more like a welfare state, where people really don’t care about development. For anybody who’s 35 years of age in Zamfara, he or she does not know the difference between right and wrong. Because Zamfara is just about 30 years old now. You can imagine somebody who was five years old at the time this state was created, and he’s used to this system. So he doesn’t know the difference between right and wrong.
Working on the mindset was the most difficult thing. But I said, we must do it and it is not impossible. There was so much agitation. They would say, give us money. I said, I’m not giving anybody money, but I’ll fix the system. I’d rather educate you, provide healthcare for you, provide infrastructure for you, train you on how you can be on your own, not to continue to make you a dependent person.
This is my goal, and there’s no going back. But the good thing is, I don’t have a political godfather otherwise it would have been difficult. Nobody would call me and say, these policies are too stringent.
Don’t do this, you’re going to do this. I said, look, you know what? It’s not about losing the election. In fact, this is just the first year, so forget about 2027. If I’m able to fix A, B, C, D within this time frame, I am okay. What I want is legacy. That’s what matters to me. I’m not here to make money. I’m here to make the system work.
The first thing I had to do was to declare a state of emergency in education. If you look at all the indices in education at the time, Zanfara was always at the bottom. We were competing with Yobe.
Education… (General laughter) You can’t have a system like that. So, we declared a state of emergency. We said, look, we must focus on education because that is the only tool we can use in changing the mindset of people. That has worked. As we speak, we have done over 760 schools. Across primary and secondary schools, we have done 700.
Now, you look at the primary schools, because that’s where the foundation is. And of course, secondary school. But more importantly, the tertiary institutions. We have about three or four tertiary institutions. We have the Abdu’l-Bissau Polytechnic, and then we have the state university. There’s also the Zamfara College of Art and Science. We have done massive infrastructure in those tertiary institutions. If you go to Zamfara, where we have the Abdu’l-Bissau Polytechnic, I have spent over 40 billion Naira in terms of new building and everything, and training the teachers also. We had to do a holistic approach to this whole thing because everywhere, crisis, problem. And you begin to wonder, these guys that were there, what exactly were they doing? Nobody bothered about anything. They’re not concerned.
Are you talking about reconstructing or renovating?
All: reconstructing, renovating and building outright. As of last month, we had 760 fully functional schools renovated, furnished and we employed teachers also. At one point we had to employ about 2,000 teachers. When we came in, we discovered that, in some cases, there was only one math teacher in more than 100 schools. I am telling you, it was like fiction. But it’s real. So we had to do that, and within a short time, things started changing.
We have bright young men and women, very intelligent guys. They just need a driver, and we have seen it because if you see the result now, it’s unbelievable. In most of these exams, you will see Zamfara is now coming on top.
How about terrorism, because once you mention Zamfara, it’s all about terrorism?
If you follow all my interviews about insecurity, I strongly believe that we are not ready for this. I still believe we are not ready because it doesn’t take anything. With technology, every movement of any bandit, I have it in my system because we have satellites and drones. Every movement is communicated to all the relevant security operators: police, military, DSS and civil Defence real-time. But it is not their priority and it’s frustrating. When you have the tool, you can neutralise these guys easily. They live within us. How is it difficult? You are telling me a bandit, a terrorist is superior to the state? How is that possible? It’s not.
I met the president and I made it very clear to him that this is what you need to do, that they are not telling you the truth.
You told him that?
Yes.
There was nobody I did not see at the top there, as far as security operatives are concerned. I said, look, the way you are going about this is the wrong way. We live with these people. We know their pain. If only you would listen to us, I am ready to provide the framework under which this can work. What they said was they didn’t have enough weapons to be able to face these guys. I said, there is no way you will convince me of that. I said, no, please don’t allow this thing to go out because it will make a mockery of the system. The essence of governance is to be able to protect land and property of the citizens. That is the first priority. And then everything will follow.
For the sake of investment in Zamfara, despite these frustrations, what measures are you engaging to show that there is hope and the state is investible?
There is no meaningful investor that will come to put in his money where his money is not secure because they are not running a charity organisation. You must be able first to secure the state and provide the necessary enabling infrastructure in place.
Before, if I tell you to go to Gusau, in fact, everybody that you know from your family will call for prayers because it is like you are just going into your grave. That was the mindset. Incidentally, it is a state that is so blessed in terms of crystal, solid minerals. You know, the surprising thing is the fact that if you look at the informal market of gold in Zamfara on a daily basis, a daily transaction of about 1 million dollars. It is informal, nothing comes to the state. This is just gold, not to talk about lithium. Not to talk about copper. Not to talk about so many other things.
If you are talking about commercial activities in northern Nigeria, outside Kano, Gusau was the second commercial centre in the north, followed by Gombe and Funtua because of the railway chain.
My father was an industrialist. I’m sure you know about Zamfara textile then. He was one of the pioneers and owners of that factory. And because of tanneries also, we had the largest tanneries in Nigeria. All the people from North Africa, Morocco, Egypt, Algeria were all in Gusau. It was a cosmopolitan city where we had everything. We had a country club. It still exists now. Because of the textile, we had Chinese, Lebanese and other foreigners. We had over 22 ginneries. We had an oil mill. We had so many. All these multinationals, SCOA, and GB Olivant were in Gusau.
When I was in university, I hardly spent the weekend in Zaria. I would drive my car from Zaria at 10pm and get to Gusau by 10.30. Because it’s just one hour and 30 minutes. The country was so good. We would go and have a party in Gusau. On Sunday, we head back to Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. That was how it was as a city. Very enterprising people. But the moment politics came in 1999, everything just collapsed. They showed them there was an easy way to make money, that you didn’t need to work hard. There is money. Don’t bother. Business, that’s too much. That was how they weakened the system.
We need to open up the state by laying the foundation for critical infrastructure. And that is what we are doing. If you go to Zamfara, we can compete with any city as far as urban renewal is concerned. We had to start from the beginning. We did fantastic roads. No compromise. Drainages. Renewable energy. If you go to Gusau at night, you will see activities because everywhere has changed.
There’s this talk about an airport in Zamfara?
I’m so excited about that. Our airport will be ready at the end of March – this coming March. We are in February now. They have promised to hand over the airport by March 31. It is both domestic and international. Our runway is the standard runway anywhere in the world. Because of technology now, we have the latest navigational equipment. We are way ahead of any airport. We are building a five star hotel, it will also be ready by the end of the second quarter of this year.
The health sector is said…
(Cuts in) We also declared an emergency in the area of health. As we speak now, we have 10 new general hospitals fully equipped with the latest technology. We have the latest MRI in the country. Latest CT scan in the country. They are 2025 models. We built staff quarters for the doctors. As we speak now, we are the highest paying state as far as medical doctors are concerned, not even the federal government because that is the only way you can attract them. And they are coming.
Go to our nursing school and see what we have because we need to train the nurses. We have two nursing schools. We built infrastructure there where they can learn because you need to also have manpower to be able to manage those hospitals. We have 10 fully equipped general hospitals now that you don’t need to go to India or anywhere for medical examination, you get it done there. Everything is online. We have full medical records. Every hospital that is built is linked.
I am fully proud to say we have the best hospital as far as the health sector is concerned in Nigeria today. Obasanjo commissioned the hospitals in Zamfara. When he went there, he couldn’t believe what he saw.
What have you done in the education sector?
Like I said, education is key because that is the first thing that we had to consider in declaring a state of emergency because of the importance of education. They would rather give you peanuts, give you N2,000 and then steal N10 million. Now, under my administration, everything is transparent.
