Mutfwang intends to correct the abnormalities in Plateau Tertiary Institutions -Dabang

 

 

 

Chief Letep Dabang is the current special adviser to Governor Caleb Mutfwang on political matters. Dabang who is popularly called ‘political masquerade’ marked 68th birthday anniversary. In this interview with our correspondent, DANIEL DAUDA, he cleared the air on what led to the dissolution of the heads of state owned Tertiary Institutions as well as other wide ranging national issues.

 

Sir how is the journey of life so far having marked your 68th birthday anniversary?

 

Dabang:The journey has been hard but by God’s grace we have come a long way. I was born into a humble Nigerian family about 68 years ago and I never knew I will reach this peak, I never knew I will play the kind of role I am playing so far in my political life. If I look back I could remember my good father, the man that held my hands and encouraged me on service to humanity and the father of Plateau State, late chief Solomon Lar who in my days as a Union leader, I  cannot forget him in a hurry in my journey of life. I also remember my fellow brother, late professor Dakum Shun who have also guided me in my political journey.

 

I sincerely want to appreciate God for having this kind of people as part of my life. I remember Senator Joel Henkwap, as a young man I was always  around him, I saw him as a role model until God called him. I look forward to elders like Baba Jonah David Jang, a very focused and determined person, especially when you look at his 8 years of governance in Plateau, he was the man of quality because whatever he put his mind on,  he would do it in a manner that you cannot fault him.I also want to appreciate Senator Joshua Chibi Dariye whose regime was very practical. It was under his regime that I was given the opportunity to express myself while I served as the chairman Plateau State Independent Electoral Commission (PLASIEC), and later I was his senior legislative aid. Within the period of my interaction with him I also picked a lot of lessons in life and it has remained part of my political arsenal. I appreciate so many elders the likes of Ambassador Yahaya Kwande, Baba D.B. Zang,Baba Musa Sati, Senator Ubah Ahmed, Baba Shehu Gandu and quite a number of them too numerous to mention. I appreciate Danladi Shemu, Senator Garba Naka, Baba Garba Shendam and too many who throughout my journey, have impacted  my life and made me  who I am today.

 

The trending issue now on the Plateau is the dismissal of heads of Tertiary Institutions and governing council by Governor Caleb Mutfwang. Some people look at it as politically motivated while some are saying no,  that the Governor sent a committee to go and verify the operations and activities at the institutions and the Governor acted  based on the outcome of the committee reports. And recently the Joint Union of Plateau State owned Tertiary Institutions held a press conference, calling on the government to reconsider its decision for the benefit of the students. Sir what is your take on that?

 

Dabang: Well, I think what you have said is very correct. There are those who look at the action of the Governor as political but it is also a matter that the Governor acted on as a result of the cry of the people of Plateau State due to the irregularities that were involved in the conduct of the recruitment in the state owned Tertiary Institutions and he will not allow such irregularities to continue.

 

We have all been on the Plateau. We are all aware that there was never a time all this advertisement has been made for recruitments. And we know all those things are guided by laws, guidelines and civil service rule which were all abused. But if it continues like that it means another can come, and been a Governor you can seat at comfort of your house and order people to be recruited in whatever manner it may be done, and at the end of the day you may bastardize the system completely.

 

So, many people cried out and the Governor was kind enough to set up a visitation panel based on the cry of the people and I believe the committee have submitted their reports to the Governor. And whatever action the Governor might have taken to my mind it is as a result of the report that he received from the visitation panel to correct the abnormalities. He did not  ignore the cries of the people, rather  he canceled the recruitments and asked them to re-advertise, to give room for inclusion. And for those of them that are qualified for the positions. He will also have some level of sympathy for those who have been there.

 

And for those who have not been qualified you don’t expect the Governor would just on sentiment engage everybody? In the situation where the union are asking for the Governor to do that I think they not being fair to the institutions…..

 

If you go to some of these institutions, some of the people recruited are not supposed to be there at all. Especially when you get to technical institutions like the Polytechnic, college of Health and Technologies, when you are recruiting people for such areas, I believe the emphasis should be towards those that have scientific orientation. But you can go and take a look at the list of the people that were recruited. The Governor had said the right thing should be done so that tomorrow  we would learn to do things in accordance with the rule of law. I think it is not intended to punish anybody, it is not intended to deny anybody any job, but it is intended to correct abnormalities and to ensure the right people are in the right place for the right job!

 

Sir you were part of the previous administration and part of the current government. What is your assessment of the two in terms of performance most especially now that people across the state are applauding Governor Mutfwang’s developmental strides?

 

Dabang: well, for me it is too early to start comparing somebody who spent 8 years and someone who has just been in office for few months. You will not be fair to one. So lets be patient and see to the end of his tenure, and if you ask same question I will give a proper comparative analysis.

 

Nevertheless, for now, for the few months of Governor Caleb Mutfwang in office it is incredible and if he continues on that trajectory , I can tell you the sky will be his limit.

 

Sir, as a special adviser to the Governor on political matters, just recently PDP candidates were denied participation in the rerun elections for Plateau North Senatorial District and Bassa-Jos North Federal Constituency. Also the 16 PDP state Assembly Lawmakers that were sacked by the Court of Appeal and certificate of return was issued to opposition APC. What is your take on this political rancor because the sacked PDP Lawmakers are saying that the judgment of the Supreme Court which reinstated Governor Mutfwang confirmed that the PDP has structure and they have gone to the court to interpret that matter?

 

Dabang: The Supreme Court did not gave any order when delivering the judgment of Governor Mutfwang. They only lamented that the PDP on the Plateau had suffered untold injustice by the ruling of the Court of Appeal. I think that was the level at which the Supreme Court stopped. And when you look at the electoral law, the Court of Appeal is like the Supreme Court for the legislators because their matters ends there.

 

The fact that PDP candidates were not included in the rerun elections held on 3rd February, 2024, for Plateau Northern Senatorial district and Bassa-Jos North House of Representatives, that is to tell clearly that the opinion of the Court of Appeal may not be necessarily set aside. If the judgment of the Supreme Court have any impact at all they could have gone ahead and participated in the rerun elections.

 

But, again, they said the law is an ass and if some members of PDP  felt displeasure and they want to challenge the decision of the Court of Appeal they are at  liberty to do so. But there is no where in the judgment of the Supreme Court where they have made pronouncement that any judgment of the Appeal Court should be set aside.

 

It is very unfortunate this is happening on the Plateau. This is a very unfortunate development and all I can say now is that all parties should be patient when we get to the end of the tunnel one party would definitely emerge. Yes, I am from PDP judgment has been passed and there is nothing one can do about it. If the Court can listen to the cries of those that have felt shortchanged, saying you have a case but we have given it to another, then I don’t have any objection to it.

 

I am only saying so because I saw what the INEC have done in the rerun elections, and I listened carefully to the judgment of the Supreme Court and they did not make any order to overturn the decision of the Court of Appeal.

 

Sir, the state Assembly has remained under lock and key, three (3) weeks after the legislators resumed sitting from recess. What are your thoughts regarding that?

 

Dabang: well, if you listened to the speaker carefully he said they were under court order not to inaugurate the new members. If there is such Court order the speaker has to obey it until it is decided otherwise. Whether this is abuse of court processes, whether they are right or wrong it is for us to wait patiently and wait to the end of the matter.

 

Sir as former chairman of Plateau State Independent Electoral Commission (PLASIEC), are you an advocate of electoral reform laws taking into cognizant the outcome of elections in Nigeria?

 

Dabang: for now this is one  of the best laws that has been  put in place to guide elections. In the past it was not the same  with what we’re seeing today because now  political parties are involved from the inspection of materials to the distribution of materials. And if such provision was not done, PDP on the Plateau wouldn’t have  been aware that we were not  on the ballot  papers until they get to the polling units. Because the political parties were involved, the press were involved and they insisted they wanted to see the materials. Whether it is the mischief of the electoral body not to display the ballot papers until at the eve of the election. The electoral law that is on ground was able to unravel that mystery.

 

You can imagine  this kind of situation the political parties were not aware and would now go to the polling units, only to discover that  their party was not on the ballot it could have been very difficult to control the situation on the Plateau. People would have lost their lives innocently because of somebody’s mischief. In my own view that  needs to be addressed  and also the attitude of the politicians and electoral officers who are sabotaging democracy.

 

Plateau have gone through a lot of insecurity. Apart from the role of the security agencies what are some of the measures taken  by the Government to redress the concrete reasons behind the killings in the state?

 

Dabang: I think the Governor have said it over and over that the Operation Rainbow would be reorganized because they have a role to play in terms of community policing and information gathering. You need to have  proper information about who is coming in and who is going out, then you have  regular security agencies who would handle the situation.

 

So, you would agree with me that this issue of insecurity has been here. It became prominent during chief Joshua Dariye’s regime, very prominent during Jonah David Jang’s regime, Simon Lalong was not spared during his own regime and Governor Caleb Mutfwang is also seeing an ugly part of it. The pattern that it is taking, is what is disturbing me as if each time when we have change of government, you would have some group of criminals who want to test the will of that Government. It happened during Baba Jonah Jang, Simon Lalong and it subsided but as soon as Mutfwang came on board they struck as if they are trying to test people who came into governance and unfortunately, they used human lives to cause all these kind of problems.

 

As for me, the security in this country is not something that one can sit down and expect the regular security agencies to handle. The security were trained to defend the citizens of Nigeria and also the territorial integrity of the Nation. It was the first time probably in the life of the military, over some years now they have to leave their own borders.

 

But for the Police, Mobile police and the rest of the security agencies they are trained for internal security. But the question is how many of them do we have? For over two hundred million Nigerians how many people are in the Police Force? We expect to have one, two, three, four or five civilians with police in their  mix. If we use our resources right I don’t see a reason why we should not have enough security, well trained in virtually  every village to take care of the movement of criminals.

 

When it comes to issue in Nigeria, we are in a big problem. We are moving up and down just by the grace of God in Nigeria otherwise this country would have been in pieces by now!

 

Sir, are you an advocate of the state police?

 

Dabang: state police sincerely speaking is yes and no, especially in Nigeria there are so many policies of government that have been put in place but people have gone and abused  them and at the end you wonder why the policies were even put in place.

 

So if we have state police no doubt we are going to recruit indigenes in the first place, they know the environment, they know the terrain, but when you have somebody who wants to use security operatives for another matter, there is a problem. If we have state police then we can now ask the Federal Government to decentralized police, to return every body to their state it would help us.

 

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Almajinci: What a Manner of Culture

 

Never despise or treat him with utter aversion or derision. Love but don’t loath him, after all there wasn’t an assemblage of role-calls or heraldry queue meant for teens who are in desirous avidity and rapacity of responsible parenting, and in a nugatory and trivial manner chose to abscond on AWOL. His parents fail him, which made him look haggard and pale, while the society compounded his woe, thus degenerating the poor gamin to a societal unfriendly foe, who is biologically patented, but socially orphaned.

 

His parents fail him as well as the society, leaving him to his fate with little faith, as he wanes.

 

In fact, if the mythic tale of reincarnation is anything truth, then he will never go back to sit on the same wall (sired by the same) parents again. Still in his adolescent age, he was naturally meant to be housed by the warmth of the nest on the wall; but the wall fell apart even without thunderstorms, and then the nest scattered into shreds and fragments, leaving him to betroth all manner of mephistophelean weathers, while the weathers in return betray him without a scintilla of mercy.

 

When it rains, he gets drenched by its heavy downpours, and during the sunrise, his tender skin gets peeled by the rays of the sunset. The son of the sun who is also consistently on the run from rainstorm.

 

Growing up without known biological parents and parental care, he adopts everyone as his parent, while his “everyone parent” in return treats  him with disdain, suspicion, aspersion without attention.

 

He is a “jaki” who works all day for his “everyone parent” like the proverbial elephant, while his much adored gratification for his gigantic Labour is usually several days stale food which had hosted maggots and other harmful microorganisms as a party ground.

 

Most times, when the hopes of dowsing the raging hunger in his belly seems slimmer, the street comes to the rescue. He struts the street barefoot ; cladded in his rag-tag almajirinci regalia, while plastic bowl adorns his hands the way irukele adorns the hands of an Oba.

 

He scavenges on anything that suppresses the ire of his intestines’ devouring hunger, knocking from door to door around the neighbourhood with the semblance of the sound of an armpit talking drum, accompanied by “fisabililah” rendition and supplications.

 

His life is mortgaged without gain or advantage as he labours for survival; but still in a dearth of hopes like debt till death.

 

He is sold out to politicians by his mallam during elections, instantly seen by the politicians as their builders’ cornerstone, while becoming the rejected one during elections aftermath.

He is a threat to one, and a friend to another. He does the hatchet job of being a harbinger of ethno-religious violence to politicians with just derisory penny as gratification; but hounded out of the state by still the same politicians when the angst of Covid-19 was raging because of the fear of its easy spread by him.

 

He is only a tool used by politicians to achieve goals, and get dumped after the task on the same task ground with a disdainful negligence.

 

Some call it culture, but he is only tortured by not being nurtured, thus turning him to societal vulture in every his in his quest for knowledge in inter states adventure.