President Muhammadu Buhari recently acknowledged the exemplary leadership qualities of the FCT Minister, Malam Muhammad Musa Bello, describing the minister as a reformer and a man of integrity. The commendations were made on the occasion of the minister’s 63rd birthday.
The president was specifically pleased by the minister’s efforts at institutional reforms, ensuring compliance and more decency in land allocations, which, he noted, was spurred and sustained by integrity. He therefore congratulated the minister for providing visionary leadership for the city that hosts the seat of government, diplomatic missions, multilateral institutions, headquarters of businesses and hospitality homes.
These endorsements for the FCT minister, coming from Mr President himself, are very remarkable. Residents of the FCT and other visitors to the nation’s capital in recent times, who have also been privileged to observe developments in the city, would agree with the president’s kind words about the current FCT minister.
This is so because what has been observed in the FCT since the 17th minister came into office some six years ago are coordinated efforts by the ex-banker and administrator to sustain the city’s upward trajectory in the areas of infrastructure and socio-economic development, in line with the visions of the city’s founding fathers.
Even in the face of dwindling resources, there are glaring facts that the minister has succeeded in repositioning the FCT as a crucible in which business, political and economic ties have been forged and are still being forged.
For comparison, when the minister was appointed in November 2015, there was urgent need for the provision of infrastructure in order to complement the ever-increasing population of the FCT. There were also so many projects initiated over the years as part of the overall masterplan of the city which had not been completed and required attention.
The danger in all of these was that Abuja, being one of the fastest growing cities in Nigeria and Africa, was on the verge of having its human population outstrip infrastructure development. It was obvious that if the administration did not complete the ongoing projects like major arterial roads within the city and to a large extent also in the area councils and satellite towns, the city would face very critical challenges, especially in transportation and other socio-economic activities.
Faced with these challenges, the minister elected to resist the temptation to embrace the attraction of high-sounding new projects which are soon abandoned. He focused instead on the projects that would have the greatest impact on the largest number of people. Some of these include road projects, the ongoing rail projects and then the expansion of the water supply scheme that are designed to bring significant benefits to the wider citizenry.
From the get go, the FCT administration trained its sights on abandoned or ongoing infrastructure projects and moved to complete them in order to redeem the huge cost sunk into most of these vital projects. Some of the critical road projects include the multi-lane ultra-modern Kubwa and the Yar’Adua Airport Express which were delivered with dispatch along with the completion of their pedestrian bridges and interchanges.
Similarly, the minister awarded and completed the Aso Villa Roundabout Bridge capping the Outer Northern Express Road (ONEX) also known as the Kubwa–Zuba Express Road. The Bill Clinton Interchange connecting the Airport driveway was also delivered on record time.
Work on other major projects like the Constitution and Independent roads traversing the heart of Abuja’s Central Business District, the Southern Parkway, the Karshi-Wasa and the Nyanya-Karu road designed to create an alternate route to the city through the south eastern flank are also ongoing. Similarly, the dualization of Apo-Wasa road is also ongoing to effectively link up the Karshi-Wasa road to the city proper.
Other masterstrokes which have struck right notes on the Abuja chord are the construction of various loops, tangent and flank roads which hitherto locked up the city at major intersections. Their completions have freed the city from bottlenecks at these major road intersections. Today, the added values from the completion of these projects have improved the outlook of the city, energised the Abuja economy and made the city liveable.
Another area worthy of mention is how Malam Bello was able to transform governance in the FCT. From the start, Bello committed himself to strengthening institutions and ensuring compliance with due process, which would later earn the FCT the top spot in the anti-corruption and transparency scorecard of the ICPC.
The minister was also able to run an inclusive government as evident in all his appointments. Right from the inner-chambers of governance, the minister has striven to reflect the colourful ethnic configuration of the country. With recent appointment of Mandate Secretaries and political aides, the FCT Minister broadened the democratic space and has provided the needed corporate leadership for most of agencies and departments of government under the FCTA.
Education, in the FCT has also received the much-needed facelift with FCT schools receiving tremendous support from government in terms of provision of infrastructure and remuneration of teachers. It would be recalled that an FCT teacher recently emerged the overall best in the country in the secondary school category, which was attributed to the provision of relevant tools for learning as well as the enabling environment.
On health services, the minister equally displayed exemplary leadership in the approach it adopted in combating the COVID-19 pandemic. At the peak of the pandemic, the minister rallied the private sector and other individual donors to provide 1000-bed facilities, a feat that has continued to receive accolades. Palliatives were also provided for the most vulnerable groups in the FCT and the Area Councils during the periods of the lockdown and restriction of movement.
When the second phase of the pandemic also broke out, the minister, in similar vein, also ensured that the isolation centres were piped with oxygens for use by patients in critical conditions. All of these helped to ensure that FCT was not overwhelmed by the pandemic, despite being an epicentre.
The minister has also not allowed the experience gained in the fight against the pandemic to go to waste as health facilities have been set up to manage other diseases like cholera, Lassa fever among others. Hospitals and health centres have also been upgraded, including the establishment of a diagnostic laboratory by the Ministerial Expert Advisory Committee on COVID-19 in the FCT.
Revitalisation of the land for infrastructure scheme, also known as the land swap programme, is also another demonstration that the minister is indeed moving towards achieving the development priorities already set by his predecessors. Not only has the FCTA under Bello been able to restructure and fine-tune the land swap agreements for the construction of new Districts, it has also reached agreement with a group known as Gwagwa Concession for the development of the Gwagwa District through the land swap model which will save the government huge cost on infrastructure development.
The stewardship of the current FCT minister, cannot be complete without mentioning the vital role his administration played in securing the nation’s capital and seat of the federal government against the activities of kidnappers and other criminals. It would be recalled that the FCT sometimes last year experienced heightened kidnapping activities which available security intelligence revealed was politically motivated to destabilise the country. The coordinated attacks, it was learnt, were aimed at striking at the heart of the FCT for maximum damage.
But the FCT Administration, in collaboration with the FCT security Committee, comprising all the security agencies in the FCT, moved very swiftly to foil the activities of the kidnapping syndicate and in the end, a network of kidnappers operating from neighbouring States and the fringes of the FCT was cracked while the masterminds were apprehended. Their victims who were kidnapped in the University of Abuja and other areas were also freed without the loss of lives. Other planned attacks were also foiled and nipped in the bud.
It is to the credit of the present FCT Minister that the Abuja project has continued to roll, despite the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and dwindling resources. That these developments have been sustained thus far despite the economic situation in recent time is a huge credit to the prudent management of resources and leadership acumen of the present FCT minister, with the support of President Buhari and the FCT residents.
Danladi Akilu,
Gudu District, Abuja
