A political party is an important organ of government, completely independent and replete with its own mechanism and internal arrangements for the running of its day-today aff airs. It is mainly driven by the decisions and policies arising from the usual way of doing things and regular conventions of people attending formal or informal meetings. Among these peoples are the Pressure Groups that often exert their infl uence or attempt to control how things are done by correcting or manipulating the course of events. Within the hierarchy and the ranks and fi le of the ruling All Progressive Party in Kaduna State, there are so many pressure groups that more often than not chip into the aff airs of the government, proff ering advises that may be imbibed or discarded by the governor.
One of the most important among these pressure groups is the Kaduna Restoration Group, a rainbow coalition of likeminded, highly ranked members with common vision for the improvement of the party which has taken it upon itself to counsel Governor Nasir el-Rufa’i to review his administrative strategy with tighter grip so as to remedy some glaring anomalies that tend to portray it in poor light before the electorates. Key members of the Group which included the governor’s erstwhile heavyweight crusaders and right-hand allies, such as Dr Ahmed Tijjani Ramalan and Professor Yusuf Dankofa had a genuine cause to caution Governor el-Rufa’i in a lengthy epistle in which they categorically urged him to realize the enormity of his responsibility to his people by squaring up to it with zeal and total commitment.
Th ey also warned him to be aware of horde of hangers-on and sycophants and imported side-kicks who always tell him what he wants to hear, avoiding useful advices that will assist him in uplifting the state. In fact, what the duo want the governor to realize deeply and sincerely was that the people of Kaduna will not only hold him by what he has done, but also by what he did not do. In that regard they have reminded him about how irritated and annoyed their group was about the secret auctioning of some government properties within a range of houses at Legislative Quarters, Kawo Kaduna. Also, Kaduna state Liaison Offi ce in Lagos and some other vital government buildings elsewhere were thrown up for grabs.
Another area of regular and continual complain is the refusal of the government to release a timetable for Local Government elections as was done by most APC-controlled governments nationwide despite a subsisting court order. Th e group views that as an overwhelming denial of people’s fundamental rights, or simply put a dishonorable attempt at disenfranchising them. Th at was not all. Th e people are decrying the governor’s insincerity at fulfi lling same important electoral campaign promises; chiefl y among them was the granting of autonomy to Local Government Councils.
Two years after the consolidation of his administration that promise had remained illusory. In the same vein, the people are not happy with the behavioral tendency of Governor Nasir which makes his government an exclusive preserve of family and friends. In the actual fact, the government has eff ectively derailed from its primary purpose of welfare delivery while his disgruntled and impoverished people remained hopeless and abandoned. While issuing a yellow card to Governor el-Rufa’i to signify the infringement of a covenant with his people, the Kaduna Restoration Group had politely pointed out to him that in every situation there could emerge a better solution and urged him to revisit the hostile and unfriendly reforms of his administration for the purpose of re-jigging its overall machinery and reevaluating its general policies with a view to making it workable and people-oriented.
Th is will entail adoption of a liberal and inclusive economic agenda that will involve the broad spectrum of the people of the state. Th is will allow Governor Nasir actualize his campaign promise of helping revive the array of moribund industries in the state which can in turn re-absorb tens of thousands of laid-off workers. Needless to say, if Kaduna State Government had within the last two years geared itself towards that accomplishment it would have achieved a lot. But instead, Governor Nasir had unwittingly embarked on privatizing the few government-owned companies and industries without any success. In fact that was how he achieved the notoriety of a governor that never sees an important project he initiated through. For the army of Kaduna State unemployed youths and their countless, jobless elders to feel the full impact of an eff ective and purposeful government they must be actually mobilized to partake fully in an agriculturebased industrial revolution. In that case the over ten billion naira wasted on school feeding could have been sensibly channeled in that direction.
It is expected that within the next two years Governor elRufa’I will come down his high horse and empanel an eff ective economic team with patriotic members to achieve these lofty objectives instead of arranging annual Investment Conferences which had manifestly shown lack or failure of hope. In the end, it is hoped that Governor el-Rufa’i will realize that development initiatives involve team work and collectivism and not “I know all attitude.” He must, therefore, learn to listen to other dissenting or advisory voices which may contain salient counsels he doesn’t seem to appreciate in his own wisdom and which could greatly assist in his overriding quest to make Kaduna State great again.
