By Kola Aminasaun
Sule Lamido, Governor of Jigawa State, got Speakers of Northern States’ Houses of Assembly together and lamented to them.  

Stately Lamido was excited.  He thrilled for his state.  He said someone had come to him with a map showing the disposition of oil and that Jigawa was a potential deposit.  Lamido also said Jigawa had a basket of other minerals, for instance, gold and diamond.

Jigawa did not have money to exploit it.  So, Lamido has appealed to the body of Speakers of Northern extraction to sensitise the Federal Government to commence oil exploration in the region.

We would not want to remind us that there was once oil exploration around the Chad basin.  To what purpose?
Oil has brought us woes not blessings.  It has brought us division; it has brought us high cost of fuel and scarcity.  It has brought us militancy, death and devastation.

It needs not be that.  It should be a blessing.  See the example of Saudi Arabia who have used their oil wealth for development.  They are aware of its potential.  Since oil is a wasting asset, they are building structures that last and at a third or more of the prices we are doing them.  I do not say there are no dubious businessmen but, God save anyone who gets caught.

We are outrightly stealing our assets and we are very brazen about it.  (See companion article).
Oil has made us lazy and we can do anything for oil money.  No-one is paying attention to agriculture and we are suffering for its neglect.  We must pay attention to it, most particularly those in Western Nigeria.  We had a mini-war pepper recently but it would be a big one next time around.

By all means, let Lamido and the Northern Speakers and President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives convince the President to renew commitment for the exploration of oil in Jigawa and the entire Northern states.

…they steal money
GIABA, Action Group Against Money Laundry, is an agency of ECOWAS.  It is an arm that has the mandate to combat money laundering activities and terrorist financing in West Africa.

Towards the end of last month, it came out with a damning report; that 10 former governors stole $250 billion in three years.  It was a cocktail of thefts but Nigeria stole the show.  It came first out of 15 countries, scoring 87.3 per cent.  Highest in Africa on the corruption index.

Nigeria embezzled, misappropriated and diverted public properties.  Nigeria also led in contract inflation.  The private sector in bribery and embezzlement at 41.6 per cent.

Abdullahi Shehu’s GIABA, of course, supported legal and financial institutions.
The ex-governors were mentioned as fiddling the till but it does not say what central positions the civil servants played.  And they are pivotal in major and minor misdemeanours.

E go good
This is a note of optimism.  That things are looking up.  In Nasarawa State, the Governor of the state refused to cut the tape to commission a project.  Because the project was substandard.

The Governor, Alhaji Aliyu Akwe Doma, refused to cut the tape for the commissioning of a secretariat presented to him.  He had been handed over a pair of scissors to cut the tape of the project when he discovered that the project was substandard.  The project had been constructed by the Chairman’s (Istifanus) predecessor.

And you ask why would Istifanus pass the project as his own.