OF LAMIDO’S TALAKAWA SUMMIT AND GENUINE TRANSFORMATION OF JIGAWA(1)

[Nuruddeen]

OF LAMIDO'S SOCIAL SECURITY POLICY, TALAKAWA SUMMIT AND GENUINE TRANSFORMATION OF JIGAWA STATE (1)
By
Jibo Nura

It could be recalled that Governor Lamido of Jigawa State outlawed begging by signing the social security Bill on September 3rd 2007. But the first thing that will greet one, especially at one of the rented private restaurants (Shemar's) inside the state's so-called investment house, is ample presence of women beggars who sit at the entrance to the restaurant on daily basis asking for money to buy food.

Another problem that grapples with the state's capital is the sign of abject poverty in people, particularly those coming from around Dutse inner neighborhoods. Others are menial job seekers and doers who out of necessity create an impromptu market for their petty trading across the street. Whenever one looks at both sides of that only main road passing through Yadi that is, starting from Hakimi street down to the motor park and up to post office road, the site of multitudes of under-aged girls and boys peddling "pure water" in coolers; young ladies hawking groundnuts, kola and akara; ubiquitous able bodied women frying waina and some physically fit men engaged in tea and bread making, are not only unwholesome and unsettling for a state capital but also go far to challenge the bases of our social existence and social security Bill gimmicks.

Although most of these problems afflicting the generality of people in Jigawa are never caused by Governor Lamido, but have their roots deeply embedded in the past administration of Ibrahim Saminu Turaki. Nevertheless, the Talakawa's (poor and downtrodden) summit initiative, masterminded and spearheaded by Onoja  Adagbo and presided over by Governor Lamido falls short of conveying its real meaning and significance to the downtrodden.

Mine is not to delve into the issue of infrastructural under development caused by Turaki or the heavily debt burden of N250 billion that was irresponsibly accumulated by the man and his cronies. Indeed, I am not in the good mood to talk about the wonderful capital development projects embarked by the present administration, because doing so may distract attention and may not allow us to have the necessary attention on the issue at stake. I therefore actually intend to seriously draw the attention of Mr. Adagbo Onoja and his boss over the issue of Talakawa, which they claimed to have been salvaging over time.

One thing that I found worrisome on Lamido-Onoja Talakawa development initiative and social security package are their lack of proper articulation, precision, frankness and exactness. I remember Modibbo Kawu, a columnist and editor with Daily Trust Newspaper telling us the need to be cautious with the entire process behind its conceptualization. Kawu highlighted all the key problem areas that touch on Talakawa's welfare and social status and offered advice as appropriate.
However, all things said, the summit is now brought to rest. We are yet to hear anything from the side of government on the progress made out of that amplified gathering. In fact, the organizers of such an important but superficially planned summit are not talking about it anymore. They fail to tell Jigawa people the promises made by individuals and Non Governmental Organizations toward elevating the plight of Talaka. Even Kawu who was part and parcel of that initial gathering at Jigawa State's Library, was disturbed about the "blue-print", which was supposed to be used as basis for action. Now it appears the whole thing is more or less a political "arrangee" to hoodwink and cajole the masses into believing Lamido as champion of Talakawa?

Indeed we are yet to hear from Mr. Onoja what happened to the millions of Naira that was spent in such a very good but seemingly abandoned initiative.

Left to me, but my understanding of Talaka and elevating his position, especially in a ravaged agrarian society such as mine, has to do with what I termed goalistic thinking and approach to human capital and resource development. The resources we have in our society are enough to turn things around. The agriculture that we made Talaka to abandon, because of lack of incentive has caused serious drawback to our development savvy. We failed to make him understand that the key to prosperity for his life as the poor lie in underexploited, edible trees and bushes in his environment. The lost treasures that can grow naturally in this dry area and give food, even in times of need. Our lack of appreciation for  plants such as Kadanya, Zogale, Magarya, 'Yar caca, Sesame, Date Palm, Kurna, Faru, Dorawa, Kanya, water melon and many of them giving us nutritious food without a lot of labour does not seem to be in tandem with government's programme on agriculture. We failed to realize that the Talaka who do not have basic necessities of life can be made to have joy and laughter. The crippled or the so-called physically challenged can be made happy and joyous. Indeed, the most hopeless of Talaka can be made to attain full hope and confidence only when we realize that we believe in our potentials.

Recently, a Swedish friend was telling me about his job in one of the poorest villages in Niger republic where he works in partnership with people of Tanout since 1987. His main interest is to help people in that village with developmental disabilities to enable them achieve full inclusion to the best of their abilities by gaining access to mainstream education, employment and leisure activities leading to independent life. Arne Garvi has today helped farmers and their families who have not had a single good rain for the past three years achieve a sustainable life with the means at their disposal. So far he has exonerated more than 2,600 households in Tanout from lack of food. He has given them a developed variety of their own homegrown plants and fruits to farm. They are now happy and have virtually full access to basic things in life.  Tanout people are now self reliant and independent and do not necessarily bother much about what their government has to offer. I therefore urge the Jigawa government to change the volte-face of their Talakawa development paradigm into a realistic framework devoid of any ambiguities. The issue of salvaging the downtrodden in Jigawa is really beyond sinking N20 million into sugarcane research at ABUCONS in Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria i.e. even when we are yet to understand its genuine potential since Turaki's era.

On the issue of social security, however, it was said that the administration of Lamido is  paying the "physically challenged" persons in the state a monthly stipend of N7,000 each; not minding the fact that there are lots of dimensions  to the social security problems in the state. Of course, there is nothing wrong in Lamido's giving help to the needy, but it does not require any advanced mathematical calculation for one to know that before any package such as this is passed into law there is the need to have a thorough statistical data analyses on the number of "physically challenged" people in a given area i.e. before embarking on resource allocation to them. In fact, the figure of 2,700 physically disabled that was officially given by government is certainly doubtful. This number I understand, was obtained out of the selected destitute from the 27 local government areas in the state. However, this figure dismal as it seems does not substantially cover up to one-third (1/3) of people that are being pushed around in wheelbarrows, totally blind or those without fingers. Probably, the government might have been referring to those disabled residing within Dutse metropolis? Because I know the numbers of all the physically challenged people given by government, can be obtained thrice or even quadrupled from within and outside the entire state. In one local government area alone, one can get 3, 000 persons if not more than who are disabled and physically deformed.

But generally I learnt that the government has now decided to increase the number to 150 of these handicapped people from each local government area. This is certainly a good omen. However, one major problem here is the manner and ways by which these kinds of people are selfishly handpicked by local governments' chairmen. Indeed, there seems to be a selective application in choosing these people of circumstance. Mallam Khalid of Ummadu village in Miga local government area is one of the beneficiaries of Lamido's N7, 000 stipend. Hear him:

"We were told that the governor has assigned a committee to look into our affairs, and honestly speaking there are some of my colleagues that their condition is worst than my own, but our local government did not bring them forward to the committee for verification, because they are selecting. I was even told that in some local governments, most of us were not allowed to be seen by the governor's committee".

What this old man was trying to explain was the state's screening committee supervisory tour on the social security issue to all local government areas. The committee was actually carried round by Mallam Bala Musa whereby some of the local government chairmen were not honest in showing the actual target destitute to them. That is why governor Lamido has to be very careful, because he has confided so much in those local government chairmen, not mindful of the fact that some of them do things contrary to what he expects them to do.

What one is trying to get at is this: there is already a monumental deficiency in government's failure to understand that the sustainability in giving the N7, 000 to those deformed persons is paramount, because there are economic and social angles of the social security problem, which the government deliberately fails to realize.  The economic angle has to do with proper utilization and allocation of scarce resources to the appropriate channels. For example, how do we achieve paying those physically challenged persons without necessarily luring and/or exerting undue influence on those that are not disabled into begging? Since the passage of this Bill, how many people have realistically gotten and are still getting this stipend? What is the government target on this so-called social "welfarism" for the physically challenged? These are some of the questions that border on the political angle of the problem that the government prefers to take just to deceive the masses. As one writer asserted elsewhere i.e. "while it is not clear whether government will be able to curtail the influx of beggars who may not necessarily be indigenes of the state but will want to benefit from this largesse", we are yet to see the identity cards that the government promised to issue for the purpose of strict identification. We are also watching from the background to see how government will miraculously defend its promise of eliminating the beggars found on the streets of Jigawa within one year of its inception into office. A cursory look at our motor parks, local food centres and restaurants can tell one that the government's taciturnity on beggars is just a political rhetoric.

[EMTL]

Indeed we are yet to hear from Mr. Onoja what happened to the millions of Naira that was spent in such a very good but seemingly abandoned initiative.

Assalamu alaikum,
Me ya kawo Onoja jihar Jigawa... The intension of Jigawa Governmnet is good but there is the need to visit the shortcomings enumerated in this article.

[Lawwali]

Indeed we are yet to hear from Mr. Onoja what happened to the millions of Naira that was spent in such a very good but seemingly abandoned initiative.

Assalamu alaikum,
Me ya kawo Onoja jihar Jigawa... The intension of Jigawa Governmnet is good but there is the need to visit the shortcomings enumerated in this article.

EMTL, Abinda ya kai Bala Muhammed (From Bauchi) Kano lokacin Rimi.