Dear Kogites,
Make no mistake about it, the future of our state is at stake and if there is anytime in our history that there is an urgent call for us all as citizens to fight in order to reclaim our state from the vestiges of vested leadership represented by Governor Yahaya Bello, it is now.
If getting priorities right is the hallmarks of a sane and competent government, then we can see that the government of Yahaya Bello by all indices and calculation is a failure.
This is a season where governors in other states are succeeding in selected and prioritized sectors of their state economy but our state is retrogressing gradually to becoming a failed state under governor Yahaya Bello and if we allow him to enthrone his crony as the next governor of the state then we would have allowed a recycled leadership failure in the state to our collective doom.
In a country and a season when states like Kebbi state has become the rallying point as the Rice hub of the nation and Taraba state becoming the rallying point of modern tea production, Kwara state remaining the most peaceful state in the Federation because of capable leadership and the working of its governments, Kogi state led by Yahaya Bello is only known as subjecting his workers to abject poverty and severe hunger and gallivanting around promising and flagging off meaningless white elephant projects that have never taken off till this day in the last eight years.
The administration of Yahaya Bello in the last eight years was regarded as one that is inhumane and lacked the capacity to getting its priorities right.
He is at it again at the twilight of his administration, making promises as he goes round trying to hoodwink our people to accepting his crony and stooge as the next big thing in the leadership of the state.
Promising to build a University at Kabba when the State University at Ayangba when peer reviewed with other of its peers in other states is a mere glorified secondary school under funded and ill equipped by the Bello administration.
There has been no water in Lokoja, the state capital for the past eight months and workers and pensioners remains unpaid. How does Yahaya Bello expect the people of the state who find it extremely difficult to feed, workers who cannot pay the school fees of their children and wards any pronouncement from him and his crony, Usman Ododo, the imposed candidate of the APC on projects enunciation to fly with the people when the prioritized project conceived and flagged off by the governor in the past last eight years is still what it is, a dream.
Any right thinking Kogite should know now and understand that our state by all indices has failed under this administration of Yahaya Bello. This is because the best and only way to put smiles on the faces of the people is through firstly, paying the salaries and pensions of workers. Many have lost their lives in this regard during this administration because his government failed in this regard.
Therefore, my purpose of writing you this open letter dear Kogites is to advice us to shine our eyes and to remind us of what we already knows, that our state is becoming a failed state under the inept government of Yahaya Bello and voting his crony and stooge, Usman Ododo is likened to the extension of the Yahaya Bello administration of Kogi state.
By all international, relevant and acceptable indices and indicators and judged by the real reality on the ground, Kogi state as it is today is justifiably regarded and categorized as a failing state under Yahaya Bello because it is now ranked among the least among “the failed” states in the country.
Allowing Yahaya Bello have his way in enthroning his stooge as governor of the state is an invitation to the complete failure of our dear state.
That is an idea without an existential context, a state existing only in name on the map as a mere geographical expression.
There is only hope for us Kogites if we make for a change of leadership using our votes in the next guber election in the state.
Our state, I believe, can be made to work again and become great which it was destined to be as it was in the years prior to the Bello administration an and become a leading star in the affairs of the country. But for that to happen, there has to be a change of leadership from anything that has to do with Yahaya Bello.
Finally, if a leader is described as a dealer in hope then Kogi state needs to look elsewhere for it’s salvation. Except if the judicial process that is ongoing on the validity of the APC primaries held recently is concluded and the courts reverse the outcome and allows for a transparent primaries that defeats the candidate of Yahaya Bello and his cronies, we need to think of a way of reclaiming our land from this clairvoyant and rent seeking political hawks masquerading as leaders.
The time is now because tomorrow doesn’t exist.
– Musa Wada writes from Abuja.
