From Samuel Bello, Abuja
Governor of Taraba State and member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Darius Ishaku in this interview spoke on happenings in the state and ideas for national development.
PDP was in power for 16 years, maybe as a result of some lapses they lost in 2015 election, has PDP learnt any lesson from that event?
Indeed, having lost an election and we are now in the opposition, we know the bitterness of being an opposition and we have learnt our own lessons too. PDP made her own mistakes just like any human organization that stays too long in a particular place would, there are obvious abuses in the party. A committee have been set up to look into what had gone wrong and how we can correct it and we are in the bid of correcting it, and we would make sure that what happened before does not occur again. We would correct it and put the party into a firm setting.
For Nigeria to get proper and good democracy, we need to as of a necessity, have vibrant political parties. Deceiving of political leaders starts from the party. If the party is well structured and properly stabilised to filter its leadership, then it will be easy to have a very good leader from any party. For example, I was in Minnesota when Obama came during their primaries to campaign with eight other party members, we watched him in the auditorium. After the debate, a professor turned to me and asked me what my take was on the debate of the eight people; I told him that the whole eight party members who are looking for nomination for the ticket of the Democrats in America are ‘A’ class. Now the question is strategizing which the A’s are and I said Obama was an A triple plus, but he won’t get it because he is black. Clinton is ‘A’ double plus and she is likely to get it but Americans are not ready for a female president yet. So I graded them and as God would have it, Obama became the president and Biden which I graded in A class, became the Vice president. So the critical point of repairs is from the political parties.
Reports have it that there is an Agric revolution going on in Taraba State; can you give us an idea of what is going on there?
Yes there is an agricultural revolution going on in Taraba State. Before I resumed office, I have always said the state is nature’s gift to the nation and is nature’s gift to herself. We have three very important things, if we harness correctly in Taraba, it would stop me from coming to Abuja to get the monthly stipends. Agriculture, mining, and tourism among others are what I am concentrating on.
As for Agriculture, we are there and we are working assiduously to make sure that we get a lot of people to farm rice. Taraba State can supply the whole country with rice. I understand that about $8 billion is spent annually to import rice. That can be wiped out by Taraba and one or two other states in the country. We would not need to be importing rice, it is available here. I used to farm rice in the 80’s, I had four square kilometres of rice farm and I was doing well. I know all the rice millers in Abakiliki, but when they lifted the ban on rice importation, my rice farm came down, all the farmers near my office went to Bentachi and they collected it, but now we are on the rise, we are on soyabeans. We are on cassava too; we have a cassava mill in the state. We are also going to palm oil; we have started something on cocoa.
The luck we have in the state is that, from the temperate climate to the tropical, we have it. I have started with the tea and it is doing very well, it has been passed in Germany. Our problem now is the quantity that we need to export. We have started on coffee, it is also in the high land and it would do well there. Wheat has been recommended for us on the high lands but I want to start one at a time. On the low lands, we have the rice which we are working very hard on, I established the best green House in the country, Taraba vegetables, if you go to Shoprite, I am sure one will get it there and other shops in town. We are working very hard on agriculture. We are trying to work hard on bailey seed and soya beans that is our targeting export; we are trying to work hard on rice and cassava to feed our people. Taraba has a lot of potentials when you talk of agriculture.
The truth is that diversification is very much possible, and it is already working in Taraba State. One time when we were bringing our truck vegetables to Abuja, somebody spotted it in Karu (an Abuja suburb), he followed the truck to where they offload the contents and when the manager came out, he asked if it is true that they have vegetables, so they opened the truck for him to see and he said he was buying from somewhere else, we told him to come and buy from us and we would supply him so he can supply to whoever. It is already working because these vegetables that are being consumed in Abuja are mostly brought in from our side. A country that does not feed herself is not yet a country. Everybody is stopping exportation, very soon oil would be old fashion but if you can feed yourself you are comfortable.
Is there any other sector that you think could help the country’s diversification agenda apart from agriculture?
Mining is a huge potential. If you ask me, I would get more money from mining in Taraba than agriculture. Problem of mining is the law, the law gave the federal government exclusive right on the mining but there is a snap. The constitution gives the states right over the land and gave the federal government the right over the mining but the point is, would you mine without going through the land? There is a problem there; there is a need for harmonisation because all the states, inclusive of mine, are afraid. As of now, if you want to start mining it has to be from Abuja, and you have to get the license.
I had a case where a fellow had a certificate since 1978 on a land. But when he came, there was an owner of the land. The fellow went ahead and put his rig and started, I said ‘no and asked the police to quit him.’ You cannot mine on somebody’s land. So unless these kinds of conflicts are resolved, the mining is painfully not being exploited.
I was in Germany for a mining workshop and I found out that a lot of these countries have gone round and broken these laws, an example is Chile, they have a very good mining law, how I wish we could learn from other countries that are mining. Australia is also good in mining, these are countries we should look into their laws, see how we can harmonise it. If I am a state governor and I am given a full license and I mine, let the federal government get her own taxes, let the state government get her taxes and then we develop the people within the mining sector, I am very sure that mining can give Nigeria a lot of money.
You were accused of mismanaging N130b in two years, how do you react to this allegation?
It is just like anybody accusing a journalist of talking too much, is that an accusation? The person did not come out with any facts. Even if I give one of my booklets to a blind person he will see that within two years my state had never gotten 30percent pass in West African Examination Council (WAEC). Last year we had 67.3percent. This is a state that came first in WAEC, in the north, for the first time after 27 years of its creation. And we were 8th in the country that is in education.
You need an opposition, but let the opposition criticise you properly not crazy criticism that is going on. The same man said that I spent the whole money of Universal Basic Education (UBE), but the contracts were just awarded last week. The point is that we take our time to go through due process.
When I resumed office, I called a meeting of the water board the next day because when I was driving to my office, I saw people fetching water from streams and I asked why, they said there has been no water for almost a year in the town. I called the Permanent Secretary who is a female; I gave her two weeks to make sure there was water. I told her to give me three names for her replacement and she did that. I did that so that incase she unable to perform the task, I will put the other person.
I also called the Head of Service to tell me what they need and I will give them and in less than two weeks we got water running from the tap. The same thing with electricity, we have done a lot of things. My state is one of the first states that have a digital television station with studio; I have a mobile van that can broadcast live anywhere I am in the state.
What is your take on the recent pro and anti-Buhari protests?
I told them in my church that it is now that I understand when they mean, when they say ‘pray for your leaders,’ the Christian faith encourages it. When your leader is sick, you need to pray for him because if he is not well, you too are in trouble. A leader has to be well to take a decision that affects you and I. We should be sympathetic and pray for the president to get well. I do not support any protests; I will rather support people to be praying continuously for him to get well. The machineries are already in place and they are working. We should intensify the efforts of praying for our leaders, this is what we are taught religiously and we should imbibe that culture. When you go on demonstration you are creating another problem, sometimes it starts peacefully, sometimes it does not end peacefully.