Editorial
El-Rufai “is the right man to fix Kaduna right.” – Major-General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd.) – November, 2014.
President Muhammadu Buhari was in Kaduna State the other day. The Kaduna State Government, under the leadership of Governor Nasir El-Rufai, did well by ensuring the president visited Kafanchan, Kaduna metropolis, and Zaria. If the president was not taken to those places, we at El-Rufai News Magazine (ENM), would have asked the Kaduna State government questions. Why?
We have been bringing reports of the achievements of the state government in those three places to our teeming readers for close to a year. It was just right the president should be taken to those places to see what we have seen and for which we have pointed out what it means to govern and govern for the people, not a privileged few who think government is for them alone.
Now, when the president was in Kafanchan he saw the great transformation that had taken place in terms of infrastructural development. ENM was the first news outlet to visit Kafanchan and report it throughout last year. We did this in pictorial, news reports, columns and editorials. If anyone thought negatively about what we did, the president’s visit had put a new narrative on it.
To us at ENM, the Kaduna State government was sure of what it achieved in Kafanchan and so it was bold to show the Commander-in-Chief. The C-in-C saw it and praised the government that achieved it. As the head of the nation, he should know an achievement when he was one, and he did talk about what he saw. If that is not enough evidence about a state government that is committed to the development of the people everywhere irrespective of tribe, religion, party affiliations etc, we do not know what is.
It is significant to note that many of the projects that the president saw in Kafanchan – new school buildings, new and refurbished buildings for clinics in every ward especially were started during the first term of the current administration in Kaduna State. They were in spite of the fact that at the time many of the LGAs (including Jemaa where Kafanchan is located) in the Southern Kaduna senatorial zone were under the opposition party.
The construction of the major township roads, including the road from the direction of Kwoi, were also started at the time Jemaa LGA was under the control of the opposition party, long before the ruling party won the last LGA election in Jemaa. At ENM, we suppose these steps taken by the El-Rufai Administration says something about the kind of government he runs. This is how government should be run – government that is positively focused, one that is dedicated to the development of the people no matter where they come from, no matter what detractors say, and no matter what the opposition does.
In fact, we take full note that in Jemaa LGA, the people voted for the candidate of the ruling party in the last LGA elections because they saw what the state government was already achieving in their area. ENM was informed after the LGA elections that the people believed that if they voted for the LGA chairmanship candidate of the ruling party, they would surely get better dividends of democracy in terms of infrastructural development, people-oriented programmes and much more. This was in the face of an opposition party that had slid into tribal and religious politics and politicking, but which the people of Jemaa LGA decided to reject in the last LGA elections for the first time since the current democratic dispensation began in 1999.
These things, the achievements of the KDSG, were what the president saw in Kafanchan and at ENM we were pleased that he did. He was also in Kaduna, a capital city that has not seen the needed infrastructural development that its status in the North deserves until the El-Rufai Administration arrived office. The truth is that infrastructural development in Kaduna metropolis has largely stagnated for years. So it was a fine sight to behold, seeing all the projects that the El-Rufai government embarked upon under the Urban Renewal Programme.
Critics have had their say. Clear-minded people have also stated what they feel about the beauty that the current administration is adding to Kaduna metropolis, and much of which ENM has been reporting since 2017. Now the C-In-C came to town and had his say too. What was the president saying that time? This is important because it is an affirmation of the view we have taken at ENM with regard to the efforts being made by the KDSG to bring back the lost glory of Kaduna metropolis as well as well as Kaduna State in general.
“If you had not been in Kaduna for sometime now, surely you would miss your road home just like me. El-Rufai has really changed the face of this state. I relocated to Kaduna after serving my jail term in the 1980s from Daura. I cannot find my way home with the current development” (in Kaduna State). That was what the President said. It’s the size of what has been done in the Kaduna metropolis by the KDSG and no affirmation can come better from anyone than the occupant of the highest office in the land.
As things stand, ENM believes that Kaduna State, through the URP, is taking the shape it deserves. Roads in the metropolis and across the state are reconstructed, made large, beautified, and cleared of most illegal users. Even primary schools now boast of structures that some tertiary institutions in Nigeria do not have. That is the extent of the vision of the KDSG and it is good that the president came to see it and commended the government that has the vision.
The president was in Zaria as well where he saw many of what had been done by the KDSG, and which ENM had consistently featured. One would want to believe that the president must have congratulated himself that he made the decision he did by supporting the candidacy of Malam Nasir El-Rufai even before the party primaries held back in 2014. One would guess that he must be very happy with the choice he made at the time. In spite of grumblings by some party members, General Buhari at the time was unfazed as he came to the International Trade Fair Complex Kaduna where he raised the hand of Aspirant El-Rufai up, presenting him to the people of the state as the man they needed, the man who would work for them and really deliver.
At ENM, we cannot but point this out because of what detractors have been saying since late 2014 and what they continue to say till now. But we think the president would feel justified considering the achievements he saw when he visited Kaduna the last time. He would feel that back in 2014 he saw ahead and many who like good things in Kaduna State would agree that the president did see ahead. They would remember and agree to what the president said when, in 2014, he introduced Aspirant El-Rufai to the electorates this way:
El-Rufai “is the right man to fix Kaduna right.”
El-Rufai “is courageous and has what it takes to perform. He is the solution to your problems.”
El-Rufai “wanted to work full time for me instead of coming to contest (for governorship). But I firmly told him he must come and contest because I believe he has the three qualities required to make Kaduna great again. These three qualities are firstly, competence, secondly integrity, and thirdly courage.”
“El-Rufai is ruthlessly efficient; because of your age or your standing in society he will not allow you to cheat the community.”
“People of Kaduna State, I assure you, I am not being arrogant, I am being honest, you are not doing El-Rufai a favour if you elect him, you are doing yourself a favour.”
I “ask for your understanding and support for El-Rufai.”
At ENM, we believe President Buhari remembers those words he uttered and he is smiling after his last visit to Kaduna.
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