By AbdulFatah AbdulRahman
”Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change.”
_Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein
Sorry my Sarakite friends, I should have known and understood your pain earlier, change could be so painful to the human mind: I just learnt so. On Tuesday, I watched a video of one Ilorin singer named Commander. He said people are now complaining because there’s no money. He said supposedly angry and hungry; ‘enu gbe’.
One Alfa also alluded to something like that last week. He was castigating Governor AbdulRazaq’s financial propriety. The Governor’s offence — to Commander and fellow ‘enu gbe’ lamentation crew– is not dipping hands into government vaults to hand out freebies to them. They have not got to realise the reign of change and prospect for greatness. Instead of coming out to say they– the lazy, unproductive weak bones Saraki used to feed with government funds are going expectedly hungry– they started lying about people were hungry. Haba! My Sarakite friends should be told Kwarans now have a choice between development and sharing public funds. In this new Kwara, only the mouth of loafers and lazy bones would undoubtedly be dry and starving.
Let us take time to ask ourselves: what do Sarakites call prosperity and progress?
I feel the answer is evident in their styles and system of governance. Even if the past is to be forgotten, some wrongs are actually unforgivable. One of them in my reckoning, is getting ruled by vision less leaders. The agony and misery is often not a tea party. And I am sure Kwarans should really know better. But like in the recent past that revelations sipped into public space, the songs of lamentation by Commander and fellow loafers Saraki bred for years should be noted too. What they portend is that the joint eaters of funds meant for growth and development of our dear state are enraged and embittered culture of impunity stopped.
Going by their wailings, what amounted to them as governance is filling the stomach with crumbs. Little wonder we were where we were. Senator Saraki’s system prioritised their desires, not their needs. He gave them food in exchange for their loyalty, clothed them to earn their praises. Naming ceremonies, burials and weddings suddenly became state government functions at the expense of good schools, road network and other basic amenities. That, to our people, was growth and development! That was the hallmark of leadership that cares!
Now, that, to me, typifies a culture of greed and established system of spending public funds to sustain political patronage — often at the expense of the public!
The Governor AbdulRazaq paying prompt workers’ salaries, renovating and constructing dilapidated roads, resurrected Kwara ministries and institutions, cutting the cost of governance, repositioning state civil service, giving women and the youth opportunities to build a working state is non- performing. To these set of people, performance and state progress is only about sustaining their lazy and loafing lifestyles on government patronage.
In addition to what the government has done across sectors in just six months, there is also a recent open bidding for 26 urban roads, advertised bid for construction/renovation of classrooms across the board, and the upcoming social investment programme which targets the poorest of the poor. One can surely feel the pulse of what is coming — something thick, something sweet– like one of my playful friends would always say.
The question to ask the ‘enu gbe’ crew is the reason for their newly found hunger. Have this government failed to pay salaries? Did the government sack anyone from their works? What was working for them that have stopped now? Ask but do not expect answers: they wouldn’t easily tell you they were eating fat on public money which have stopped coming. Governor AbdulRazaq is no Father Christmas and can never do any good to these people.
There should never be any doubt as to why we must embrace change in its totality. Although quite funny, the cry of agony of the lazy and loafing bones under whatever guise further reinvigorated my belief in this administration. Only the hard working masses rightly deserve to be cared for!
Kwarans should just be wary of being contaminated with negative thoughts and mindset now that we have a choice to grow. We must never look back in the march to Kwara of our dream.
May Kwara succeed!
