On Monday, November 25 2019, a memo sent to governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara by former governor Abdulaziz Yari requesting to be paid the arrears of his 10 million naira monthly entitlements as the ex-chief executive of the North West state emerged in the public domain with social media platforms taking the lead in sharing the leaked memo.
Then on Tuesday, another piece of news filtered into the public square announcing that the Zamfara State House of Assembly has repelled the act which mandated the state government to pay the 3 ex-governors of the state a monthly upkeep allowance of N10 million each and pension equivalent of the last monthly salary they enjoyed while in office. According to Mustapha Jafaru who spoke to journalists in Gusau at the end of Tuesday’s plenary, every aspect of the bill was abolished including the entitlements due to the former speakers of the state house of assembly.
Nigerians have continued to react to Monday’s developments with disgust wondering why such a bill was even considered in a poor state like Zamfara with myriad of socio-economic woes. The national outrage provoked by former governor Yari’s leaked letter is understandable but what many did not realize was that the bill which was signed into law in the last weeks of the ex-governor’s regime also had accommodations for former deputy governors, speakers and God-knows who else. Could former commissioners, assemblymen, SAs, PAs and political heads of parastatals have been beneficiaries of the now-abolished oddity?
Zamfara And Its Many Socio-Economic Woes
To get a handle on the reasons for the widespread anger which greeted Yari’s request, one needs to understand a few things about Zamfara as a state.
The state created in 1996 by late maximum ruler Sani Abacha is one of the poorest states in Nigeria with 92% incidence of poverty according to official records made available by the Human Development Initiative of Oxford University.
The state has a debt profile estimated by BudgIT to be in the region of 80 billion naira. Zamfara is a largely agrarian economy with more than 80% of the population according to information from the state government actively involved in one form of pre-historic agricultural activity or the other from where they earn their living.
Three LGAs in Zamfara- Bukkuyum, Maradun and Zurmi- according a publication by UNICEF has 240, 560 out of school children who roam the streets everyday begging for alms or committing petty crimes.
In the 2018 national common entrance exams into federal government unity colleges, only 28 pupils from the state registered and their performances were amongst the worst.
In the last one year alone in Zamfara, more than 1, 000 persons have lost their lives to bandits, kidnappers and several other criminal groups who operate freely and without restraints in the villages and semi-urban areas. Scores have fallen into the hands of kidnappers where they were forced to pay hefty sums to secure their freedom, many never made it out alive.
Like in most states in northern Nigeria, preventable diseases such as cholera, Neisseria meningitides, tuberculosis and their likes continue to kill hundreds and thousands each year in Zamfara. The health facilities in the rural communities are decrepit with very few medical personnel available to cater for the scores of sick people who approach the medical facilities in search of remedy to common ailments. The state also has high incidence of death through Vesico Vaginal Fistula (VVF), maternal and infant mortality and all such problems many would believe a modern society must have surmounted.
Yari’s Greed
It is sad that rather than make laws to mandate succeeding governors to pay attention to the development of the education, health and other critical sectors that would uplift the living standards of Zamfara people, Yari only sought to protect himself from the vagaries of a failing economy by making sure he continues to feed on the resources of the state for the remainder of his life. How more shameless can a leader be?
It is even more disturbing when one recalls that the former chairman of the Nigerian governor’s forum and a close confidant of President Muhammadu Buhari who ruled Zamfara for eight long years paid scant regard to the welfare of retired civil servants while in office.
He was also alleged to have diverted bailout funds received from the federal government meant to cater for the payment of the state’s civil servants salary arrears. A media report at the time alleged that the former governor used the state’s bailout funds to build a luxury hotel in Lagos- a charge he denied although questions lingered concerning how he channeled the billions his state received from Abuja at the time.
Why was Yari so selfish and inconsiderate that he convinced himself that the future of the state should be mortgaged to his greed? To be clear, it was all about Yari and his insatiable desire to keep feasting avariciously on the resources of the people. He never cared about any other person- not the poor and downtrodden in the state, not the youths and definitely- not the future of the state.
You may go through the length and breadth of Zamfara and not find any signature project that Yari initiated and executed during the eight years he ruled in Gusau. At any rate, it must be made clear that the former governor never really ruled from Gusau- he spent most of his time in Abuja and when he got tired of seeing the usual faces, he would quickly hop into a jet and fly off to any destination of his choice in Europe, America or the Middle East.
He was President Buhari’s regular company in many of his foreign trips and it is a shame that a president who claims to love the poor never asked his friend to sit back and cater for the welfare of the people who elected him.
Enablers of Yari’s Greed
More
worrisome for many is why the state house of assembly at the time never rang
the alarm bell to call attention to the obnoxious proposition presented by
Yari. What of the opposition parties and politicians in the state? Were they
not aware? Was the bill conceived, presented, debated, passed and signed into
law in secret? Did any media channel bring the matter to public attention? It may be true the assertion by many that evil
persists in Nigeria because few are willing to challenge it.
47 Other Ex Governors and Deputies Also Draw Pensions From The Public Treasury
To
be clear, Abdulaziz Yari was not the only man who sought to secure his personal
financial security after ruling a state since the beginning of the 4th
republic. On Wednesday, November 27th 2019, Vanguard newspaper
reported that 26 out of the country’s 36 states spend N37.4 billion on pension
claims of former governors and deputies. According to the report, payment of
pension to former governors over a four year cycle are highest in Bauchi,
Rivers, Akwa Ibom, and Lagos States with former governors drawing N23.18
billion N2.795 billion, N2.043 billion and N1.606 billion respectively every
four years.
In Lagos, former governors Bola Tinubu, Tunde Fashola and Akinwunmi Ambode earn hundreds of millions from the treasury every year. Like in the 25 other states captured in the Vanguard report, this includes statutory entitlements- the type Yari demanded to be paid, housing (in Abuja and Lagos), domestic aides, cars and furniture. The situation is not dissimilar in Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Abia and so many other states across the country where ex-governors and their deputies live as kings to the detriment of the hungry masses. Never mind that some of them retire to the senate or are appointed ministers, ambassadors, presidential envoys from where they continue to draw billions from the treasury.
Bright Sparks From Zamfara
The good thing is that the Speaker Nasiru Magarya has demonstrated great courage by leading the house to speedily repel the law Yari signed to benefit his greed. Question now is: when will the 25 other states follow?
You can add: should Nigerians keep quiet over this day-light robbery of the public treasury by men and women who may have likely looted more than enough to last them 10 lifetimes?
