The splitting up of the North over the performance of President Bola Tinubu became manifestly undeniable when, last weekend, the political and civic leadership of the region met to discuss the footprint of the present administration, as it relates to the North, since its inauguration on 29th May, 2023.
The meeting, which took place at the Arewa House, Kaduna, attracted both former and serving leaders. The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) insisted that the president has neglected the region, which gave him over 60 percent of the votes to break the tape to win the presidential poll.
Dwelling on the event theme, “Assessing Electoral Promises: Government-Citizen Engagement for National Unity,” the meeting turned into a cacophony of voices, with the ACF Chairman, Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu, reeling out a litany of lamentations that he claimed trailed the removal of the fuel subsidy.
Describing what many see as a complete abandonment of the region, which was instrumental to his emergence as president, Dalhatu noted that the low budgetary allocation to the agriculture sector and the wave of insecurity ripping across the country remain causes for grave concern.
Darkest of Our Past
Apart from alleging that the zone was experiencing its darkest period in the fight against insecurity, the ACF chairman expressed frustration at what is being given to the zone, even after several engagements with the president, to attract the attention of the government and also tackle some of the problems confronting the poor masses in the zone.
Dalhatu not only aligned with Sen. Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, who recently criticized the Tinubu-led government for alleged marginalisation of the zone, but the ACF leader also painted a picture of abject poverty, which he said was caused mainly by government economic policies.
In his summary of the performance profile of the Tinubu administration, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, was emphatic on the fact that the region was set on the path to self-discovery.
Describing the current administration as focused on delivering unprecedented dividends of democracy, the SGF noted that the North, under Tinubu, has fared better and witnessed many strides in various areas of national endeavours.
He said, “Let me be clear: the Renewed Hope Agenda is not a slogan. It is a working governance blueprint structured around key principles—transparency, accountability, equitable participation, and the rule of law.”
Akume, who led the chairman of the Northern Governors’ Forum (NGF) and other top federal government appointees, which included Ministers such as the Minister of Information, Hon. Mohammed Idris; the Minister of Defence, Mohamed Badaru; and the National Security Adviser, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, among others, declared that Arewa has benefited from the present administration, considering the many ongoing projects in various parts of the area.
He advised those advocating for the return of the presidency to the region to abandon the thought, saying the North should wait until 2031.
Despite the current hardship in the region, Governor Inuwa Yahaya noted that there are visible strides of development in various parts of the North. He recalled several infrastructure projects currently being handled by the Federal Government, which include the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano expressway; the Kano-Katsina-Maradi rail line; the Kaduna Refinery Rehabilitation; the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano Gas pipeline; the Kolmani oilfields exploration; and the neutralization of no fewer than 300 bandits and insurgent commanders by the security forces.
Still Divided
It’s impracticable to have a unanimous voice in assessing the administration of Tinubu over its mid-term report card. Even the harshest of critics would agree with me that the North has passed its darkest moments in the history of insecurity. Not only was insecurity ripping across the zone, but some local government areas, especially in the Northeast, were experiencing horrifying tales of kidnapping and the decimation of communities. Despite the appointment of Northerners to take charge of security issues, eight years of the immediate past administration in power proved woefully inadequate to smoke out terror gangs from their safe havens and bring them to justice. Former Governor of Niger State, Dr. Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu, has ascribed the fate of the region to the complacency of the ruling elite. Northern leaders must move fast to arrest the rot. While insecurity has not been completely eradicated, according to Ribadu, efforts are ongoing to obliterate criminal groups permanently. The valour of the security forces has served to checkmate the activities of criminal elements that are out to undo the security of the nation. As the Minister of Information once said, the insecurity challenges may not be over, but it is clear as day that the security forces have successfully unleashed collateral damage and degraded the capacity of these criminals to a considerable extent.
What Must Be Done
For the North, which has become the dominant power wielder in the country, shutting the door to the presidency against the region in the next two years, including the growing threat of a comeback for Tinubu in 2027, is turning the future into an unsettling possibility. When people assign themselves as guardians of Northern interests with only their motives being the major driver, the woes of the zone can only provide a platform for selfish elements to seize the moment and rise to political relevance. What the North needs right now is to remake itself and recapture its consensus-building capacity to promote unity. To expect that Tinubu’s two years in power are enough to surmount challenges in the North amounts to an exercise in futility. If we must take pleasure in criticising the present, we should interrogate the past in a bid to understand the present dilemma. Now that the North is becoming a husk of its former self due to the selfishness of some of its leaders, who stole so much and have continued to use the Northern platform for their economic and political survival, fighting for a North that is long dead has become a mirage, as the inheritors of Sardauna, Sir Ahmadu Bello, are now only engaged in deploying ethnic and religious sentiments to secure a prime place at the table of power negotiation for their political and economic empowerment.
