My Regrets as Kogi Gov – Capt Wada

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Capt. Idris Ichalla Wada is the outgoing governor of Kogi State. He has been in the saddle for the last four years and will today hand over to Alhaji Yahaya Bello. In this interview, he speaks on how, as a sitting governor, he was defeated at the poll, his achievements, regrets and what he will do if he ever gets another opportunity to govern. Excerpts:

What is your assessment of the last governorship election in Kogi?
I’m an emotional person. I’m a human being and I cry when there is need to cry. But don’t forget that I’ve been a pilot all my life. I’ve faced so many dangers and life threatening situations that I’ve handled with some level of collectedness. So, I don’t allow emotions to override me in public and many situations. If you know some of the challenges I’ve faced, you’ll see that some of the things that happened recently mean nothing to me. The issues related to the last elections were very complex. You could recall that I commented on the day of election, when I went to vote. I tried my fingers on the card reader for about 10 times, on two different card readers, and they did not recognise my fingerprints, and I was disturbed. I said this is the only election being conducted on that day in Nigeria, you’ve thousands of card readers in Abuja, why did INEC bring only two to my polling unit as the governor of Kogi State at that point in time. It was totally embarrassing and I suspected there was a conspiracy to deny the people the opportunity to exercise their franchise. There were thousands of people lining up in the sun, and at the point I went there to vote, which was well after midday, they had not accredited up to 10 people due to poor performance of the card readers. I challenged the man, why are you not using the incident forms to register the people and, he said, ‘sir, we are trying to see if the card readers can work.’ What can you do at that point when you don’t have the technical capacity? You need to register people. Otherwise, they will not have opportunity to vote. It was then that he started issuing the incident forms. I commented on the shamble arrangements at that time and, also, I suspected some conspiracy to disenfranchise my people. But after the election, when the results started coming out, I was disturbed because I expected we would have done better. We ran a very good campaign and it was clear that our profile was rising. We were able to tell our stories and some of the things we intended to do if given another term in office, and many of the people believed in us. When the result was declared inconclusive, I said, well, there was still another opportunity for us. But when former governor Prince Abubakar Audu died, to me, there was nothing in the election as far as I’m concerned. If in the cause of running to become the governor of the state you lose your life, then, what I’m fighting for. So, I surrendered to fate and God Almighty, and started looking forward to carry on with my life. Yet, I needed to show leadership and give hope to our supporters even as we seek judicial interpretation of the matter at the tribunal.


What would you say is your biggest achievement in the last four years and, looking back, what are your regrets and what would you do differently, given another chance in office?

I think my biggest achievement is stabilising the security of the state. The fact that most of our citizens can go to bed with their two eyes closed now, to me, is a major achievement. Also, the way we’ve promoted agriculture and many people are rushing into it. We’ve been able to liberalised land ownership and that’s also, to me, a good achievement. We have provided infrastructure within the resources available to us. You can see Kogi Hotels, Lokoja Terminal, it is a model. The Kogi House project in Abuja is ongoing, the vocational centre, it is a model for the whole of Africa. You can see the quality of roads that we are constructing, look at the drainages we are doing for stabilisation of the main trunk road to Lokoja. We have done quality projects that will improve the lives of our people. I think I have a few other things I can point to: Our tertiary institutions, the university, polytechnic and colleges of education, we have funded them as best as we can. I think, over the last four years, our people have been more united and lived peacefully together. The only regret I have is that I don’t have much time to complete some of the things I’ve planned for the state. In terms of when I come back, if at all I do come back, I will be very careful as to people I select to work with.

Your administration embarked on the Alo Cement Company project as part of its industrialization drive for the state, what is the current status of that project?
One of the fulcrums of our transformation agenda is industrialization; we have encouraged a lot of investors to come to the state, we have liberalized the business environment for investors and one of our successful partnerships is the Alo Investment Company. As for Alo Cement, it is public private partnership; we have about 10 percent of the holdings. We provided the land and facilitation. The project is 95 % completion now and hopefully by April, it will be ready for commissioning. It is a matter of timing that I’m living now otherwise, I would have had the honour of commissioning the project. The project is owned by a Chinese group which has confidence in my administration, and everything had gone well. We have been able to sort out communities, land issues and if you go now, you see that the company is almost operational. They told me that in the next three months, they will do a test run and they will be in a position to commission the project. Everything in that project is transparent and it has gone on very well. There is also an ethanol factory that is going on around Banda area, it is nearing completion too. It is a totally private sector investment that will be leveraging on cassava and other crops to produce ethanol. In Geregu area, there is a new ceramic factory apart from the West Africa Ceramic Factory. It is private sector driven and owed by a Chinese company and they are doing some steel works there and also ceramics. So, our industrialization policy is working.

What is your take on the current fight against corruption by the President Buhari led administration?
I believe that corruption has been a major challenge of our country and has reduced our pace of development substantially. There are a lot of wastages on account of corruption, but I believe that while the war against corruption is good, it must be prosecuted diligently within the ambit of our law. Nigeria is a democratic society and our judicial system is very sound. So if people are suspected of corruption, they should not be embarrassed through media trial. They should be given the chance to go through the judicial system because allegations are not convictions. Let us not play up allegations as if the man has already been convicted. Let us allow due process of the law for a man to be convicted before he is shown  to the public as a criminal. Let the court decides. So, I’m in support of the war against corruption.

What do you have to say about the current water shortage in the state?
The challenges of water in Lokoja are occasioned by two things: One is power supply. We have one 1,000 KVA generator for the greater Lokoja water project. It is very expensive to run generator for 24 hours. The power supply to the state capital is poor. We have been doing our best to get the A Electricity Distribution Company  to download some of the power for us from Geregu, most of which is serving Abuja. So, we are suffering in the midst of plenty. As a state, it was our vision to go into bilateral arrangements for power generation, so that we can have improved power supply. We are trying to map out an arrangement where metres will be installed for people to begin to pay for water in Lokoja because people have not been paying for water in Lokoja. You know that water is more expensive than coke. To process water, it is more expensive than coke; people can afford coke to drink but if you ask them to pay for water, they will begin to complain. We are working on a template to use in collecting water rates to help us because the cost of maintenance is very high. Every month, we have to pay a lot of money for chemical, manpower, servicing of machines and all that. And also, part of our strategy through the bond project is to ensure reticulation of water to parts of Lokoja. So, when the bond is properly funded, you will see a lot of digging going on in the state.

Credit: Daily Trust

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