Musa Mailafiya Mada is the North West Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC). In this interview with Northern Bureau Chief, MUHAMMAD SABIU, he speaks on the party’s fortune and its chances in Zamfara and Kano states in 2027.
Let us look at the performances of APC governors in the last one year in the North West. Is the party satisfied with what is happening in the five states in the region governed by your party?
Our governors have done extremely well. For example, the capacity demonstrated by Ahmed Aliyu, the executive governor of Sokoto State, has given us the confidence to beat our chest. Aliyu has exceeded the eight years the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ruled the state. Look at his record in one hundred days in office. No governor in the country has done what he did. And look at the projects that he commissioned during his first year in office. This is a statement of facts. We in the party are happy with his achievements within a short time.
We have gone round the five APC states as zonal officials and conducted our investigations diligently and without bias. We have asked questions from the people, especially those who are not affiliated with any political parties across the zone. Such people helped us tremendously in arriving at our decisions.
The feedbacks from Sokoto and the rest of the states governed by our party state were fantastic. The story of Kebbi State is amazing, too. The governor, a fine gentleman, has proven bookmakers wrong. His performance is everywhere for people to see. He has changed the narrative by putting people first in governance. If you go to Katsina, you will agree with me that His Excellency, Dikko Radda, is doing very well, too. You know his is one of the states in the zone battling with insecurity but he is up and doing to ensure that the state is secure. He is doing well in terms of service delivery.
Come to Kaduna, I don’t need to tell you, you have been around during the 365 days of Governor Uba Sani and beyond that. Malam Nasir el-Rufai did his very best and the present governor, Uba Sani, is carrying on from where el-Rufai stopped and expanding beyond the Kaduna metropolis to the rural communities. A few days ago, I went to one village, Kukumake and learnt that he was in that village to flag off a road construction project.
If you go to Jigawa, too, the governor, Umar Namadi, is performing well. We are proud of our governors. So far, they have not disappointed the party.
It seems the APC is gradually losing popularity due to the present hardship in the country.
The APC leadership of today is different from what it used to be. What we have today are people with vast experience and the intellectual capacity to deliver and set the party on the right path. I think the hardship you are talking about is temporary. President Bola Tinubu has set the country on the path of economic revival. I believe with time, people will smile. Let us keep hoping and praying for our leaders.
The reason why are we assessing our party’s performance is for us to find out where we did well and where we need to improve. We usually sit down to examine ourselves and tell ourselves the truth. Where an officeholder performed well, we hail them and where their performance is poor, we tell them to adjust. Those who performed well, we never forget to tell them to sustain the tempo. We are not a party that deceives ourselves. Because the moment you become contented with what you are doing for the people, you will start neglecting your responsibility and start becoming arrogant to the people. That is what chased the PDP out of power; they did not value their members. People’s feedbacks are very important for the growth of a party. You will recall that there was a convention of the party where one of the presidential aspirants and some governors walked out of the convention at the Eagle Square and the party did not consider this as something serious. They told the aggrieved members to go to hell. And what happened? These underrated souls dealt with the party. The rest is history. We are on course.
Our difference from the others is that we are a party that tells ourselves the truth. Even before the general election in 2023, we went round all the states. In our zone, we sat with the party officials and aspirants, as well as stakeholders to discuss our journey as a party. We told ourselves the truth. Where we needed to bridge some gaps, we set machinery in motion to close the gabs. We sat with our governors. We engaged them on policies we found were not favourable to the people. We reconciled aggrieved party members. We did a lot and at the end of the day, it helped.
The APC has lost Zamfara and Kano states. Do you think your party has what it takes to reclaim these states?
The NNPP is just buying time. Since they assumed power in Kano, they have been busy pursuing policies that are anti-people. The demolition of people’s businesses, dissolution of emirates, etc, are giving us advantage. I saw a report on the four emirates where citizens were expressing their views. The NNPP in Kano has offended the people. They are indirectly promoting the APC. We are grateful to them. We pray they continue to repeat their blunders.
This demolition of the emirates is an action that touches the people’s hearts. If you watched a vox populi conducted by a television station, you will understand the severity of their action. Simply put, the people are regretting voting for the NNPP in Kano. We are looking forward to 2027 for the people’s payback. But we will not just rely on that; we have a very good representation in Kano. We have the Deputy Senate President, the national chairman of the APC. We have policies in place that are people-oriented unlike NNPP policies that are anti-people.
In Zamfara State, the governor is working for the APC; he is working against himself. He is working for us. Why am I saying this? The vast majority of the people in Zamfara voted for the present administration for one reason: security, and not any other thing. The sugar-coated speeches he made during campaigns were based on security. Has he delivered on security? No.
Since he assumed office, he has been playing blame game. He was interviewed recently by a television station and he apportioned himself 75 per cent performance on the security. This is laughable. Well, the people are going to be the judges. At the time he was apportioning himself 75 per cent on security, some villages across the three zones were attacked by bandits. He was in Abuja blaming the Federal Government, blaming everyone. People did not vote for him to be making excuses. Leadership is about facing challenges. Before you ask for leadership from the people, you have to be prepared. We are going to reclaim these two states. They are already campaigning for us.
But the people are happy with the urban renewal project going on in Zamfara State.
The urban renewal project is a scam. I want to be quoted. The urban renewal project is an eye service. He came to power condemning the previous administrations and yet he has not done anything for the people. I have responded several times to what the state commissioner for information is saying, that 13 months of PDP government is better than 24 years of APC in the state. That is so ridiculous. That is a shallow point of view. I want to tell you that the main road the governor was bragging about is the road from Bello Barau to Investment House, a road that is not up to one kilometer. He met the road as a dual carriage way. Who made it a dual carriage way? You know who did, yet he was acting as if he constructed the road.
He commissioned it when work is still ongoing. He also commissioned Lalan to Lalan road, a project that is not up to 50 per cent completion. Quote me here and I challenge everybody. I was in Gusau. I inspected all the commissioned roads. That was what I discovered. The ones he did and the ones he intends to do are not up to the ones Bello Matawalle did when he was governor. Nobody can challenge that. It is very clear. In other words, he rehabilitated roads that people could see, that travellers could see, neglecting the interior where the vast majority of the people stay. That is fraudulent.
But he cleared the pensions of retired civil servants. No government had done that before in the state.
I doubt that. During the time of Yarima, he was friendly with workers. He did his best for the workers. He paid pensions and introduced incentives for civil servants. The records are there. So, credit should be given to whom it is due. The present governor did not know what was happening in the state before he became governor. He had not lived in the state. That is why he is just saying things he likes. The Civilian JT, he did not create it. It was created during Senator Abdulaziz Yariit time when he was governor. And when Bello Matawalle took over from Yari, he trained them. So, the present government did not start it. He did not start the training as he insinuated. The members were trained during the immediate past administration of Matawalle. I stand to be corrected. We have evidence.
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