Speaker House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara,
in this interview spoke extensively on the lingering disagreement with the
governor of his state, Bauchi,
Mohammed Abdullahi Abubakar. He denied that the
fight had to do with the Governor’s refusal to give vehicles to National
Assembly members from the state, or his alleged governorship ambition. He also
spoke on other issues in this interview with Iheanacho Nwosu,
Recently the governor of your state said your
frosty relationship with him was because of your 2019 ambition. How true is the
assertion?
If I have to address this issue, I will do so
with a lot of pain, for so many reasons. It is something that I always wanted
to suppress, always, I have treated it with extreme maturity in the sense that
a lot has been said, a lot has been misrepresented to the general public, but
we always show maturity, in that it is not every issue you respond to and that
we will work, regardless of what is being bandied about as the truth to be able
to find solutions to this. Now, in addressing the issue directly as to what the
problem is, as a matter of fact, I truly don’t know where the problem is. We
started very well, but I must say that from the beginning I noticed certain
things that really didn’t make me comfortable, because we were projecting change agenda right from the very day we
started having campaign funds. When the President was going to visit Bauchi, we
held meetings about the resources that were available to organise the rally and
specifically, if I could recall very well, that meeting took place in Senator
Suleiman Nazif’s house. We started it
somewhere, but we concluded it there, and what transpired at that meeting –
granted my deep knowledge of the situation at hand – gave me a lot to worry,
because as at that time, we already had the primaries and knew who the
candidates were and to be candid, from that time I started praying that our
worst expectation as a people would not be realised.
So, we moved on, we campaigned for change and
God crowned our efforts and we were able to form government from the centre to
the states and to virtually all the nooks and crannies of Bauchi, we were
elected unanimously by the people who believed in the message we delivered.
So, what could, therefore, be the reason for
this kind of crisis? Initially I was told that I was in a fight with the
governor or the governor was fighting me, but I didn’t just believe it, as I
thought it was just a joke, until the matter came to a head when my three local
government chairmen in the constituency, together with some elders of the party,
decided to pay me a courtesy call in the National Assembly in the glare of the
media in one of the halls where I enjoined them to support the people, support
the government and the governor so that we can realise the promises we made to
them and everybody was there. Clearly that message was on record and was
published and aired on all major media outfits but as soon as they went back to
Bauchi, they were suspended and queried about why they visited me. On this, I
had cause to confront the governor when we met at the State House and I sought
to know from him why he did that, he then told me that it was because he had taken an oath to enforce our
laws and that these chairmen came to Abuja without his approval and the law
says he must approve, he had to implement the law, otherwise he would account
for it on the day of judgment, since he has sworn that he will execute the law
faithfully. I said okay, if he felt strongly about it, no problem. But
apparently these local government caretaker chairmen had taken permission from
the Permanent Secretary in the State Ministry of Local Government, but because
it wasn’t the governor, he said he must
be the one to grant such permission and not any other person. So he suspended them
and I said well, that must be it.
Few weeks thereafter, I decided that I was
going to intervene in improving the wellbeing of the people in my constituency
so I dispatched a medical team to go the constituency and attended to the
health needs and challenges of the people there. When they got there, they were
specifically told that they couldn’t use any of the state facilities for that
intervention. I just couldn’t understand why, but that was when I started
really getting signals that all may not be well. I was taken aback. On account
of that we had to relocate that particular intervention to Abubakar Tafawa
Balewa University Teaching Hospital in Bauchi, since that is a federal
facility. So, no one could stop us. The
events escalated to the point where we were told glaringly that I led a team to report the governor to the
president, that was one of the allegations and that the members of the National
Assembly had requested the governor to buy vehicles and houses for us in Abuja
and because he said even if he is swimming in money he would not embark on that
kind of bazaar. He actually said that even in the media, but unfortunately
right now he has bought the vehicles and given cash to some members that he
believed are loyal to him. So, maybe he has started swimming in money now that
he has done that. That can be confirmed. Some of the members he gave the
vehicles have come to me as their leader and told me that this is what the
governor has done for them, so they are not lying. He said that was why we were
fighting him. These are specific allegations
that I think we owe a duty to rebuff so that people can really know the
truth.
Did we report him to the President? The answer
is no. Not at all. And this is a story that needs a lot of pages to be
published, but I don’t know if there has
ever been a governor in Bauchi that was stoned in his first year in office, yet
that was becoming the order of the day
in Bauchi as anywhere the governor went to, he was being pelted with stones.
These reports were everywhere and it
came to the ears of the President and obviously, if the president wants to know what is going on in Bauchi I am
the one who is close to him here, so he literally summoned me and sought to
know what the problem was. Why would the people who brought in a government
with so much zest and expectation start stoning the governor? The President
wanted to know what was really going on in Bauchi and I told him (President) that Sir, they said I am
fighting with the governor and any time I have an opportunity to discuss
anything with you, you know that I don’t discuss personalities or mundane
issues. I always bring issues of national interest, but because they say I am
fighting with this man so I am not in a suitable position to tell you, but I
beg you, if you give me another appointment, I am going to bring elders from
the state that you can speak to and they will be in a better position to tell
you what is wrong in Bauchi. So the President instructed his protocol and said
that Bauchi is home to him and he values the contribution of people of Bauchi
to his election and wants them to pick a day that he will have minimum of two
hours that he will devote to this problem. So that shows you how important the
President considers this issue. But it wasn’t because we begged him for
vehicles and he didn’t give us. It wasn’t because he refused to support me to
be Speaker that was the issue, it wasn’t because anybody had reported him. It
was because the people were getting so angry that they decided to take their
own destiny into their hands and everybody knows, you can find out from them in
Bauchi, that, that was the direction we were heading to, a very dangerous
direction and the President needed to intervene. So, after this appointment was
given to us, the President suggested about two persons that were going to join
the team. We formed that team, went to the President and briefed him. He
listened to us, all the elders, each person in that delegation took time to
talk to the President. After, the President now said go and enlarge this forum,
when you have expanded the forum, articulate all the issues that you perceive
that if they are addressed, all will be well in Bauchi; itemise them, call the
governor, give him and then I give you two weeks to bring back the report to me
and bring a copy to me as well. That was the directive of Mr. President. So, we
went and enlarged the delegation, they are all alive today and can testify to
this and then we set up a committee of the APC elders in Bauchi to draft the
document and come up with all issues as directed by the president which we
could then use to meet with the governor. When the work was completed, we
studied that document and found out that we had a perfect document; if the
governor could solve between 60 and 70 per cent of the issues, then we would
have forever solved this problem of people taking laws into their own hands and
trying to express their grievances by pelting the governor wherever he goes.
We then summoned a meeting with the governor
and he gladly attended. We had a discussion and presented this document to him
and he said he had already solved more than 80 per cent of the issues we
itemised, it was just because we had not been meeting, else, he would have
informed us. But that in the newly found spirit of brotherhood, he could
guarantee that he had solved most of the
problems. So, we now said fantastic, take
this document sit down with your team, review it, all the ones that you
have implemented make them as implemented, if there is one or two or three issues
that are not there, we would come back, meet and agree on them then we would
now take to the president, that these were the issues that were still
outstanding and needed to be resolved. No sooner than he left the place, he
said that he was no longer interested in the intervention, so we were left with
no choice but to report back to the president on what happened. He had the
document for two weeks with all the issues that we raised and that document is
still available out there, we even gave it to the party. It was after two weeks
of handing over that document to him
that we saw the President and told him this is how far we had gone and this is
the document we gave to the governor. So, whether he will resolve it or not ,we
don’t know, but this was what happened and where we were, because we owed it a
duty to report back to the President. We thought it was good that the party
should also know, because the leadership of the party was beginning to express
worry too about the turn of events in Bauchi, so we decided to take the same
document that we took to the President and gave it to the party. So, where is
the issue of reporting someone in this case? The issue of reporting does not
even arise.
On the issue of begging for vehicles or even
houses in Abuja, this is the third time I have won election. Truly speaking, I
don’t know if it is in the culture of the state to buy houses for members from
that state or senators as I have not receive any, anyway, so I can’t
remember when we sat with the governor to discuss this. There was never such a
meeting and we have challenged him if that meeting took place, where did it
take place and when? But he was on BBC and all major media outfits that it was
because we begged for vehicles and houses and that he said even if he was
swimming in money, he woldn’t do it, that we are fighting him. There was never
a discussion like that. I cannot recall any. If they ever discussed such a
thing, perhaps it could be with some of these members, that he had bought
vehicles for right now. I don’t know if they were the ones who asked him, I
can’t even recall.
Now at another fora, he even jettisoned those
as excuses and said I was fighting him because he didn’t support me to emerge
as Speaker. I found that to be laughable, because that shouldn’t be the case,
as there were many people out there who didn’t support. As a matter of fact, we
have Dr. Sani Abdu who is a member of the House from a constituency that
is a neighbour of mine, if there is anyone we should be closer than any
other member from Bauchi, because we share proximity and he was the one that
nominated my opponent in the election but we now have excellent working
relations with him. Even the man who contested against me Rt. Hon. Femi
Gbajabiamila himself, we are not sworn enemies so why should I be an enemy to
the governor on account of the fact that he refused to support me?
Is it true that he didn’t support you to become
Speaker and what did he do specifically which may amount to trying to torpedo
your aspiration?
He has said so, so it is true because this one
is a confessional statement directly from his mouth. He has said so and
therefore I am not the one saying he didn’t support me. But he told the whole
world that he refused to support me and that is why I was angry with him.
However, that is not the basis of our anger. God gives leadership, to be
candid, everyone in Bauchi will tell you the circumstance under which the
governor emerged during the primaries. God used human beings and I am happy to
say that I am one of them. In fact, that is why these issues have lingered for
this long without me saying anything because my fear has always been that
if he fails, I must account to the people of Bauchi because I gave my words and
went with him, campaigned with him and told everyone that cared to listen that
this is a credible alternative to what we had then.
Did you know him very well before then?
Let me tell you what really happened. To be
candid, from day one, he wasn’t my candidate. Everyone knows that in Bauchi.
There was nothing he didn’t do before the primaries, but I refused to see him,
because he wasn’t my candidate. But circumstances led us. He became our
candidate on account of the fact that we were just angry with the candidate the
institutions in Bauchi were promoting. I had to take the same Dr. Sani Abdu to
see the main candidate that our traditional rulers and the institutions in Bauchi,
everyone was supporting. Apparently we blamed him a lot because obviously he
had already formed his government. He had an association within the APC known
as progressive circle and they had their SSG, commissioners, etc. He was
already behaving as if he had become the governor, without us, so we now said
if we go with this man what will be our fate in this movement? Because
sometimes you have to look at things from the perspectives of how interests
will be accommodated in politics. And more so he was alleged to be sponsoring
people against us and I had gone to tell him clearly that these are your
people, they are in your campaign structure, if we must work together then you
have to get your boys to stop running against three persons specifically that
is myself, the senator now and the member from Tafawa Balewa, but that didn’t
happen. So, it was only on the day of the primary elections that I now sought
from the APC elders from my zone that if they are not going for this man that
everybody wanted in Bauchi, even traditional rulers have said this was the
person they wanted who of the remaining candidates do we go for? We now shifted
support from the candidate everybody wanted, to say we would support M. A
Abubakar to be governor, as against the man that everybody wanted and he knew
that. Everyone in Bauchi knew that. In fact, all the elders were looking for
me, but I dodged them, it can be confirmed. I didn’t see them until after
the primaries to go and repent. So, everyone now tells me they are holding me
responsible for what is happening in Bauchi. They told me that clearly. But the
point is I never interacted with him, I knew him from far and didn’t know who
he was.
You said that when you were preparing for election
you had this fund raising event and something happened there that made you
begin to have doubts about him. What was it?
Well, I know that as journalist that may be
the only area that interests you, but , I will leave that one until I have an
opportunity to talk to our people in Bauchi State and certainly that
opportunity will come, but I don’t want to probe that further. Like I said,
everyone was there; all the senators and members of the House of Reps, the
governor and his deputy were all at that meeting and we all know what happened,
it was not a fund raising event. We didn’t have an explanation on some issues
that needed to be accounted for, even though the whole thing was to favour him.
So, that gave me my first baptism of fear about him, that I hope that we have
not made a mistake and to be candid, as soon as the government was formed that
was the blunder that we started with. A loan of N4 billion was taken and as you
know for you to take a loan it requires the resolution of the state House of
Assembly and that resolution has to be passed by the state executive council.
The executive council had not been formed and there was no resolution of the
state House of Assembly, but a forged resolution was procured. The matter is in
court so you can quote it anywhere, it is not something that will make someone
sue you for libel. Who passed the resolution on the floor of the House of
Assembly? Was it ever debated? Then N4 billion was taken with no explanation
and we ran in this election based on the Buhari principles, that we would be
transparent to everybody. As a matter of fact, if you listen to our campaign
and the promises of the governor, he said clearly that every kobo that accrues
to Bauchi, he would first of all tell the people that this is how much I have
and this is how I intend to spend it. It’s there on radio and everywhere but is
that the case now? Nobody knew what the N4 billion was used for which was
procured by a fake or a forged resolution of the State House of Assembly. We
have all the records of sittings of the Assembly there was never a time the
matter was even mentioned let alone debated and then a resolution passed,
never, it didn’t happened. Then it was after that we started hearing lots of
things.
Last week, when you said the basis of your
disagreement with the governor is due to the fact that he is not delivering the
dividends of democracy and they replied that you are not in a position to say
this because you don’t go home, that you are out of touch. Why are
you staying away from your state?
I was elected to work in Abuja, not in Bauchi,
they were elected to work in Bauchi, so if I’m seen more often in Bauchi, then
it means that I’m not doing my work. If they see me more at home and not in
Abuja they should query me, the other way round, if we see them more in Abuja
than Bauchi we should query them. Unfortunately, that is the case now, they
work more in Abuja, maybe they want me to go back and take over their
responsibilities. To be candid, it’s not my responsibility to be home every day
or every week, because I work in Abuja. To claim that because I’m in Abuja, I
don’t know what is going on at home, is to engage in acts of denial; I have my
parents, my aides and people at home, so if anything is going on in Bauchi I
must know, I have aides who work with me in the National Assembly here who go
home every week and they feed me, members go home, as a Speaker, you have the
entire nation as your constituency, perhaps as a governor you can say I have a
domain, I don’t have to go anywhere else, unless I want to, but in my own case
I don’t have that luxury. If a member is empowering his constituents in Lagos,
you’re expected to be there, if you’re invited, you just have to go there to
provide him support, if the event is in Kano, you just have to go, so you find
out that virtually every weekend, those who watch TV or are on social media,
they will see me there. It’s part of the responsibility of doing my job,
sometimes they offer chieftaincy titles when you go as a gesture to show that
you were there. So it’s not a job that gives you that latitude to say that
every week, you must be in Bauchi, to check what is going on, that is why I
don’t see my job as a class monitor, to always go see what the governor is
doing. I want them to shame me, but I cannot be shamed by being branded an
absentee legislator, for goodness sake, I’m not a member of Bauchi State House
of Assembly. Once you watch proceedings in the National Assembly and you don’t
see me that is when you can say I’ve absented myself. So, if they want to come
and work with us in Abuja, let them leave what they are doing and come, if they
want us to take over what they are doing and help our people, so that they can
see us every day in Bauchi, fine and good. The thing is that our people said
you go to Abuja and they said you we trust you to handle our affairs in Bauchi
and we have feedback constantly, anything good doesn’t hide itself. So, if they
have projects that we have not seen, let the say these are the jobs, these are
the contractors, these are the amounts for which the jobs were done; until that
is done, we are just resorting to primitive instincts.
Do you have plans to contest 2019 governorship as
alleged by the state government?
No, I don’t have that issue, and I cannot
fight because I want to be somebody. The people in my constituency will tell
you, even the man who literally dragged me into politics will tell you, I never
wanted to be a politician, as a matter of fact, even as we speak I always say
that politics has restrained me and I’m not living to my full potentials. So
this being governor of Bauchi is not on my agenda at all, I can tell you this.
Well, politics is there, you can never say, but it has never been on the
agenda, but what I’m trying to do now is to perhaps lead a struggle for good
governance in that state. Good governance has eluded Bauchi State, it doesn’t
matter who amongst us will provide that leadership, I’ll support that person
100 per cent, we just want good governance. I want development and I’ll
lead it and I believe that majority of our people will tag along with me.
Are you disposed to finding an end to the conflict
or you see it lingering till 2019?
Well, for someone who literally closed the
door to a Presidential mediation, closed and slammed the door against all
efforts by the president to mediate, you can now imagine, who else? The
President offered it on a platter of gold that he wanted to mediate, but the
door was slammed against that initiative. For me reconciliation will come
on it’s own if it must come, and the only window of having that reconciliation
is for us to see development taking place across Bauchi State and see local
government funds released to local governments, so that they can perform;
pensions and salaries being paid, honour restored among the people, that is why
we are looking for good governance.
You said you are going home next week?
Certainly, I’m going home soon. I’m going to
flag off some projects that I’ve attracted and then we will address them.
Unfortunately, they said we are not doing anything, but to my surprise they
went to commission a project that I attracted, and they drove on the road that
I facilitated over 80 kilometers on account of my representation. There is no
single pothole on that road, it’s about 82 kilometers long and it’s a federal
road that I facilitated as a result of my stay here, that’s the road from
Bauchi to Tafawa Balewa. Everybody will tell you the state of that road before
it was resurfaced and everything strengthened, apparently it has become one
best road in the state, everybody will drive on it and still say legislators
are doing nothing. If that is the only thing I’ve achieved, at least I’ve
achieved something, but for the governor, we need to pose a question in support
of the people who say maybe he lacks the motivation and love of the state to
perform.
SUN NEWS
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