By Onimago AbdulSalam
After the February 25th Presidential election and its outcome, the outgoing governor of Kwara State, Mall AbdulRahman AbdulRazak sighed a little in relief at his anxiety and fear of losing his reelection bid, but to his surprise, he found out that some sections of the State and the public amongst the citizenry voted for the then APC Presidential candidate owing to the popular notion of the South’s turn and the “Awa lokan” advocacy and that gesture might not be extended to him and his party come 11th of March this year. Despite the purported victory, the PDP has rejected the results and vowed to challenge it in a court of law.
Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazak in his fear as usual resorts to some crude measure in ensuring his reelection victory and that of his party. Amongst those measures was transferring monies at the rate of ten to twenty thousand nairas randomly to people just to support their ambition, he rounded up various groups and associations and bribed them with a huge amount of money worth thirty to fifty million nairas. This spending is coming from an administration that has not commissioned a project since the assumption of office.
The governor not satisfied with this stage of inducements upgraded his spending spree by trying the same method of transferring monies worth hundreds of thousands to INEC officials and millions of naira to their Bosses at the State and national levels. He further took his father Christmas and the Greek gift to the security agencies bribing them with a whooping amount of monies in hard currencies and promises of juicy contracts if reelected, a video of a top military officer accusing Gov Wike of trying to buy the Security trending online recently will attest that almost all the Governors sought this dubious mean to get reelected at the expense of emptying the State coffers.
Mall AA’s urge could not allow him to see the danger he was about to create for himself and the State if he didn’t stop his callous act of manipulating the process just to perpetuate himself in power. A friend while analyzing the gross abuse of office by the gov said “Rahmani nor Kwarans are not the ones in danger, that he the governor is the Danger.” I can’t agree less, because why will a man who has been a colossal failure try so much to remain in power? He the governor even went as far as threatening the monarchs and leaving them with options of accepting his 50 million nairas each to support his ambition or getting dethroned if they obliged.
The governor needs to be reminded that the power of the people is greater than the people in power and there’s nothing he can do to stop an idea that has come, an idea of Alhaji Shuaib Yaman Abdullahi who has vowed to end the dark era of the governor’s maladministration and set our State on the path of development and prosperity. If this project for a better Kwara scares the governor, he’s better advised to concede and accept his fate because the people are determined that they won’t remain idle in the process of reclaiming the state from the brink of collapse.
The governor should be warned that Kwarans can not afford the State to be thrown into turmoil and unnecessary breakdown of law and others because of his cluelessness in dragging our revered traditional rulers to his dirty politics. Democracy has always been about the choice of the people to freely elect their Leaders but trying to subvert that choice shows how desperate the governor had become. In other States in the country, the ruling administration campaign with feats, positive milestones, and chains of achievements, in Kwara, Gov AA center of Campaign is what Saraki should have done and why same Saraki is preventing him from doing it. The gov and its media urchins have assumed the roles of the opposition by attacking anyone that poses a threat to their reelection while leaving their constitutional duties in chase of frivolities.
Dear Kwarans, nothing is impossible to accomplish, unsitting a sitting gov is very much possible if the majority are united in purpose and determination, the determination to sacrifice their time and come to vote and defend their mandates till it’s been reclaimed. In place of this, the people are enjoined to collectively come out and send the party and governor that has thrown them to this untold hardship away then usher in a new and fresh breath, a breath filled with hope and fufillable dreams, a breath of positioning Kwara a top State in intramural development, economic growth and human and capital development among the comity of States. Let’s make it a date on the 11th of this month and vote for the PDP and its candidates across the board.
Onimago writes from Agaka, Ilorin.