BY BABAJIDE KOMOLAFE

Chairman of Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programe, SURE-P, Mr. Christopher Kolade, Monday, advised the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to emulate the bottom-up approach of Katsina State to governance as strategy for winning the general election in 2015.

He gave this advice in Lagos at the guest speaker Forum of the Nigeria Leadership Initiative, NLI.

Kolade said: “If PDP uses the template (of Katsina state government), it will be sure of 2015 election. But the way they are going right now the road is far.”

The forum featured the Governor of Katsina State, Dr. Ibrahim Shema, as guest speaker. Shema, who was represented by the Head of Service , Alhaji Ali Muhammed, presented a paper titled, “The Challenges of Political Leadership.”

Speaking further, he said: “In the Nigeria Leadership Institute, the focus is on leadership that performs because we believe that performance is the real test of leadership. That is what is demonstrated by the government of Katsina State. Katsina state has confirmed to us that there is hope that leadership that performs can be achieved in Nigeria.”

He said that the performance of the Katsina State government is because the thinking is more dominant than the politics.

Citing the example of the approach of the state government to the utilisation of the subsidy fund, Kolade said, “People had always forgotten that only 41 per cent of the subsidy money belongs to the federal government, and is managed by SURE-P while 55 per cent goes to the states and local government and they have autonomy on what to do with the funds. However, out of all the 36 states, the only state that sent a delegation to SURE-P to learn how to manage the fund is Katsina State.”

Commenting on the speculation that the proposed amendments to the constitution include recommendation of life pension for the Senate President and Speaker of the National Assembly, Kolade said such provision is contrary to the principles guiding pension payment. He said to qualify for pension, you must have spent specific number of years in service, and the pension is based on your last salary.

“But I heard that the one recommended is to be based not on the last salary but on the current salary of the current leadership. The pension you receive depends on past earnings, and the pension they want to legislate on is the pension that says if my last salary was say N5 million, and my successor two generation on is now receiving, say N10 million, because he or she is now on N10 million, my pension would also be N10 million. Now that is a ridiculous extension of pension.”