By Salihu Adam Jiddah
The man and the will, the man with the hope, the man with the zeal, the man of honour, class and taste, the man of courage, the man of peace and visibly the greatest leader and achiever to have lead our dear state; Prince Abubakar Audu.
The name Audu will always ring a bell for generations to come for his ideas, his positive ego, his achievements and as a leading and shining example in the leadership struggle in Nigeria and Africa in its entirety. I got to know Prince Audu around 2001 in Dekina central Masjid where he came to pray with us; I joined other teens to look at him through the window, it was a marvelous opportunity to wave him and in his usual ways, he cheered us up. Audu was loved charismatically by all.
As a governor, Prince Abubakar Audu was a one governor in Nigeria, the first and only Chairman of Governors’ forum from the opposing party. Arguably, there was no one like him in his time. He represented our country Nigeria at so many fora to champion the cause of development during the Olusegun Obasanjo’s reign as president.
What prince Abubakar brought to table as governor was a developmental agenda, devoid of the crazy money sharing, propaganda and hypocritical tendencies. It was a pure development in its visibility. This was seen through the numerous projects he instituted and completed during his little time and with diminutive resources like the Kogi state University, the Kogi state polytechnic, college of nursing, Health schools, so many community roads in the state linking all local government, rural electrification in almost all local government, beautification of the state capital through projects like the confluence beach, the beautiful roundabouts, the commissioners quarters that has remain the best government buildings since the creation of kogi state, the housing estates, the stella Obasanjo’s Library, the massive funding in mass transportation (kogi travelers) which he termed “The Millennium Innovation”, the water projects in most local government and so many unmentioned projects. As at that time, there was no argument as to the best developing state in Nigeria.
Audu placed us ontop from nowhere. As we speak, none of the projects I have mentioned above could be equaled by any other government after him in the state; neither could those who hijacked the state; maintain most of the things he did for us fourteen years after. Before Audu established the University and other institutions of learning, kogi state was battling with about 40% percent literacy level but today, kogi stand at above 60% literacy level, the highest in the whole northern region.
That is a vision.
Infact many of our youths would have been in school should we not negotiate leadership with politics and handed politicians the destiny of our dear state; they overturned development for politics, remove youths from school and handed over machetes, guns and all sorts of dangerous ammunitions to them, Kogi became a state with war lords, free for all and we shamefully stepped down from the development podium. This is it; this is how we painfully lost all.
Over the years, its rather unfortunate that instead of celebrating our growth and development, we have continued to be detached from so many ill-allied government; totally disconnected from the people, except those they want to use to earn their political objectives; a situation that has created an earth-shattering ideological bankruptcy in our social and economic life.
Today, youths are neither modeled by successful academics, business men and women, artisans etc, but accidental political class and their co-shoplifter because of “their wealth” and “societal difficulty” we have found ourselves. The unadventurous political misinformation, has lead several government to always draw an apt on the issue of development and it contributions to our social, economic, and political environment as an important economic strategy in their proposal. However, it is copiously patent, that this has remain on the manifesto documents until the usual four years of re-election as rituals and clink of the political class, to explore and brainwash the helpless people especially the youths, in an attempt to use them as political dogs.
If we must get back on the developmental track laid by Prince Abubakar Audu, then the political rhetoric’s must change from tribes, region and religious belief to quality of personnel who want to handle government. We must be able to make it difficult for moneybags to take away what belongs to all of us; we must continue to vote wisely.
Prince Abubakar Audu to me is an institution, A University of Leadership; that politicians must enroll and accept to learn from. He was a very peaceful man, always thinking about the people. When we lost him last year, what cames to my mind immediately was that we do not deserve him; we are yet to pay fully the mistake of choice we allow politicians to make for us long time ago.
Lagos is today a simple example of development, but if you check very well, many are of the opinion that successive government tends to be better; but here in kogi state, the argument in the street is that Audu remain the best after fourteen years, followed by Ibrahim, Wada and there is presently an ongoing debate between Wada and Bello on who is better. But if we remember, although lagos was a developed state as the capital of Nigeria in the recent past, but comparing the pace of development between Kogi and lagos will put kogi up clearly during Audu’s reign.
Fourteen years after, Lagos is becoming a country in terms of strength and kogi like a local government where percentage salary payment has turned to breaking news; if they are even paid at all. This retrogression must stop; this is not what we bargained for. We must look back at history, we must work together, and as a people we must
accept one another; I believe thats where our strength lies.
Last year during the election to the house of assembly, my friend Hon. Salihu Idachaba who was a candidate in that election and I were together with Abubakar Audu, his Son Muhammad, Former accountant general Itodo Ubolo, Sani Ogwu and other notable politicians in the state; at his residence in lokoja. My short stay with him and the idea
sharing on that election only amplified my love for him.
He continue to chant the cause for voters education and the need to stand firmly to ensure votes are counted and announced, the rumours of pretentiousness echoed by politicians who always meet him for their personal gain was to me a complete fallacy. I only saw in him, a man who was loved by all for his intimidating political qualities. This is why politicians do not like him. He ensures contract are well executed before payments are fully made, he does not negotiate quality. That is what we knew him for, that is what we wanted as a state and that is the reason kogi people voted him again massively to return him to power beating the incumbent governor in seventeen out of twenty-one local govt. areas in the state. But we thank God all the same that we lost him as a hero.
Prince Abubakar Audu would be remembered for years and by generations as his contributions to the state will remain the scale for politicians for years to come; I simple consider Audu’s sacrifices as a Legacy of Service and I
pray that the Almighty Allah forgive his shortcomings and grant him eternal rest, may God keep his household together, and may God rise so many Audu’s and those sleeping giants who are even better than him to come up from anywhere, either Igala, Ibira, Yoruba, Nupe, Bassa, Ogori etc with beautiful ideas; that kogi shall be great again.
In Audu we lost a leader we will not forget soon but as a people we will work to keep that flame of ideas he brought, in the struggle to liberate our state, we should hold it dear as a promise that whenever the mantle of leadership fall on us, we shall go back to the archive of history and navigate through his ideals of developmental fanaticism.
The painful reality today is that Prince Abubakar Audu is dead and gone forever but his name, ideas and lessons will remain with us forever.
On behalf of Kogi Liberation Movement, I salute the Prince of the Niger for his time with us and the leadership he provided. It is my sincere prayer that his soul continue to rest in peace-Ameen
– Salihu Adam Jiddah
Founder: Kogi Liberation Movement and Lecturer at the Federal University Kashere, Gombe State.
