Senator Ibrahim Musa who represented Niger North Senatorial District in the last assembly has thrown his hat in the ring in the race for the Niger State Government House come 2019. In this interview, Sen. Musa who chairs the Board of the Nigeria Export Promotion Council (NEPC) says he is relying on God and not Generals Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida and Abdulsalami Abubakar to unseat Governor Abubakar Sani Bello next year. Excerpts:
The 2019 elections are around the corner, which position are you contesting for?
In 2015, I contested for the governorship of Niger State; that’s why I couldn’t make it back to the Senate and I couldn’t make it at the gubernatorial primary. However, I intend to throw my hat in the ring once again and contest for the governorship under the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Why do you want to contest for the seat when you and Governor Sani Bello are from the same zone and political party?
I want to contest because a lot of things are not happening in Niger State. The governor isn’t performing; he hasn’t performed to the expectation of the electorate. Nothing is happening in all the major towns in the state. They don’t have pipe borne water.
Though the problem of electricity is not exclusive to Niger State, other governors intervened by liaising with the DisCos and other electricity agencies to improve power supply in their states. But in Niger State, hardly you do you get hours of power; and the governor is there. We’re supposed to have more power supply in Niger because we generate power, but that’s not the case.
If you talk about roads, all our roads are bad. He has not constructed a single 10-kilometre road. I’m saying this without fear of contradiction. So, I feel it’s my duty to come and rescue the people of Niger State.
The incumbent governor defeated you in 2015 at the primary when he wasn’t on seat, now that he’s on seat, how prepared are you?
I’m very optimistic that I’ll remove him because he has not performed. People are not happy with what he has done. He made a lot of promises which he has not fulfilled. There’s nothing on ground to show in Niger State.
What’s your support base?
My support base is the electorate; they’re not happy.
To contest for any political office in Nigeria today, money must come in; how prepared are you financially?
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When you talk of money; that’s why most of our politicians fail us. If we rely on money, I’ll bring my money to buy you. After buying you, I’ll think of recouping my money. I believe you need money, but you must not use a lot of it. What you need is money for logistics. If we continue to rely on money or moneybags to come and pick our political structures and win elections, our politicians will continue to fail us. The issue is, when I pay money, I buy your conscience. That’s what we want to prevent.
Niger is a unique state with two former heads of state. The governor is a son of a retired colonel, aren’t you afraid that these generals decide who gets what in the state?
Don’t forget these generals are not God. If God so destines that I will be, I must be. Don’t bring that issue. If you ask me on who I rely, I will say I rely on God; not on anybody. The fact that we have generals and his father is a retired colonel doesn’t bother me. All I rely on is God and the people of Niger State.
There are reports that since 1999, from Kure to the present governor, they all got to Niger State Government House with the blessings of the generals?
No, no! God destined that they would be governors, and they became governors.
If you’re elected Niger State Governor, what are the key things you’ll do to turn around the state?
If I eventually get elected, I will turn around the economy of Niger State. We have a lot of infrastructure. This is a very big state that has arable land. We’ll encourage farmers; especially rice farmers, on the Anchor Borrowers Scheme (ABS). We’ll get in to make our people benefit more. We’ll make available incentives to our farmers. We’ll get them fertiliser early enough during every farming season. We’ll purchase tractors.
When you come to the issue of roads, every state you go, our state is the worst; with very bad roads. So, in terms of state roads, we’ll make effort to construct them. In our first year, we’ll concentrate on very essential roads. We have one road that’s linking Kontagora-Bangi to Kebbi and Zamfara. We’re going to open it in our first year. We have Luma-Babana road, we’ll also work on it. There’s Minna-Bida road, we’ll also work on it. There’s Sarkin-Fawa road that links you very easily to Kaduna, we’ll also do it. We’ll undertake to do them in one year. This is what I’m assuring the people.
Where will you source for funds to execute these projects you listed?
How much has the Federal Government given states? Government gave them money. Look at what President Buhari did to the states. There was this bailout. There was also the Paris Club Refund, not to talk of federal allocation and Internally Generated Revenue (IGR). What do you need? It’s only if you’re a greedy person that you can’t work for your people. If you’re not greedy, there are a lot of things that you can do for your people.
DailyTrust
