2023 is APC exit date from Gombe Gov’t House
In this interview with PERISCOPE, the chapter image maker explains it present role as opposition and other sundry issues.
Can you introduce yourself? Hon. Muritala Usman Dukku, Publicity Secretary of Gombe State PDP.
How has it been playing opposition after years of dominance in Gombe? It is another class that we entered and we have learnt alot, opposition is good, if you are not one you won’t know alot of things. Very importantly, you will not know how to correct some of your mistakes, we are sure that by 2023, PDP will go back to it previous glory.
Playing the role of opposition has been really difficult as there have been alot of issues in the state that PDP declined comment, why?
When it has to do with security issues one needs to be very careful, until you have examined the situation before you say something about it because anything that has to do with security particularly now in Northern Nigeria, is something one has to be very careful. If you look at it this APC government is like a copy and paste government of Kaduna State Government whatever that happened in the first tenure of APC government is happening here. Gombe was the most peaceful state when PDP was in power you will not hear ethnicity crisis, religious crisis but now there is christian fighting christian in Billiri, Shongom. The governor has been making hate speeches that are tantamount to genocide recall the popular Tumfure comment. We have been urging security agencies to do the needful in ensuring peace.
What were the mistakes you have learnt?
You know when ever you stay long in government, you will think think differently expecting things to go as envisaged, you may divert from the of masses to attend to your own interest and it cost us alot. If you look the way the party is going from national, state, and local government up to the ward level there is inclusiveness unlike before. If you look at the way politics is going PDP will come back both at the national and so many states.
How about Gombe State?
If you talk about Gombe State and 2023, PDP is already there, we are just waiting for the exit day, the day they the APC government will go out of the Government House and we will continue with what we are doing. All the people of Gombe State have realised that PDP is a better party and its candidate is the best to govern them. With the way things are going contractors, politicians, civil servants in most nooks and crannies they are crying about this government unlike before. So, I’m sure by God’s grace 2023 between 9am to 12pm they will be chased out. Just hour after voting has commenced they will be gone, if 100 people can cast a vote in Gombe State, I don’t think APC will get three.
Don’t you think PDP govt abandoned projects are conduits inherited by the Yahaya’s administration?
The issue of mega park I challenge the government of the day to probe the contractors of mega park because I know the previous administration paid 85 percent of the contract sum but the contractor refused to complete it. The only challenge the previous administration had was not completing school of Nursing, unfortunately this government has taken the school from Dukku to another side in order to exaggerate the contract sum. Government is a continuum we expected that this government will complete it Dukku people are not happy with them and we will punish them with our votes.
Government recently employed over 3,000 persons as development facilitators, and other infrastructures, it contravenes your view ?
This is very funny, and it is mere say, you can’t compare two years of PDP administration from the time of Muhammad Danjuma Goje and Dr. Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo, two years of each of them is better than the four years of this APC administration. You can count what they achieved. When this government came to power there is about 4,345 youths employed as marshals but they chased them out. Since the inception of this government it has not employed people into the civil service. This over 3,000 development facilitators are not employed by the state government but also an NGO programme and has not started yet, they are just picking the names and may be paid from August, September when election is around the corner but people are wiser than their expectations. In this government we are not just talking about corruption, they are rooting out the very system or foundation of Gombe State.
What is the very foundation of Gombe State?
That is why we have Jewel in the Savannah as identity, it connotes development this government is taking us two step backwards and not forward.
Government has been building roads code named network eleven hundred, opening open areas for residents and businesses?
Network eleven hundred is a project of African Development Bank and World Bank is an access road for farmers in rural areas to urban centres to sell their products but this government hijacked it and out of the eleven Local Governments you can’t go to any LGA where there is road of more than 15km except Gombe LGA where you have 28km to 30km in the metropolis. In Dukku, the only road I know government built is from Malala -Zalne- Dukkel which is not up to 16km, it about 15km 800m.They are just good in propaganda, condemnation of the previous government. APC government has turned contractors to beggars, while some people from outside come to execute contracts in the state in respect of somebody.
You received defectors recently, how did you convince them? It didn’t come to us a surprise or to any Gombe person. Any patriotic person is expected to dump APC and come to PDP not because of politics but for the sake of Gombe. This government is killing the very system or foundation that we know in Gombe State. Ordinarily, it should be from opposition that people will defect to the government but now it is from government to opposition. It tells us that they are patriotic and not after money because opposition doesn’t have money.
Recently, Reps member Yaya Bauchi Tongo also defected, some claimed he lasts relevance? Time will tell, let’s see if he is not relevant or not capable what he will do APC will shed tears after the election. It is not true that he may not cling the Senate seat in APC as reason for his defection, politics is a game of number, you can’t decide for others no matter how highly influential you are you have single vote. It is not an issue of ticket but patriotism.
It been refuted that the defection number was over bloated, that hosting 11,000 defectors at that venue was impossible, how true?
You can go to INEC and ask them the number of voters in Funakaye, it is not propaganda and the day of election people will see the 11,000 defectors in reality.
The day of defection there was disruption at the ground, what caused that ? How can PDP attack PDP, judging from scenarios that happened in other parts which are related to thuggery. There was this time hoodlums attacked PDP office at the Gombe local government, there was a time a serving senator on arrival in Gombe was attacked was it PDP that attacked him? This government wants to bring thuggery into the state. We are very sure that APC hoodlums went to Funakaye to burn the venue of the defection.
How was the situation brought under control?
The PDP youths over powered them they were chased away from the venue that was how we were able to continue with our programme. We were not there for violence but rather for jubilation. On the day of election let us see if thuggery can bring them back into power.
Stomach infrastructure seems to have come to stay how will PDP achieve vis a vis the economic challenges?
People have tested PDP and they know the prices of commodities during PDP administration and now they have tested APC administration whose slogan is ‘jigi magayin’ an Hausa proverb. Now they can tell which administration is best for them. In the past businessmen used to get alerts in form of intervention but now what they get is debit in form of revenue. When it comes to promise we fulfill more than we promise unlike the others who have alot of things unfulfilled.
There are indications that you are going to get more bigwigs, how will your party marry their aspiration with those already in the party?
That is very simple, interest, personality, support aside, we will give them a level playing ground for them to play their cards. Whoever emerges winner at the end of the primary election, we will come together and back him because of our party. The candidates know it is one person that can govern at a time, there is no way two persons can at the same time.
What will be your call to Gombe voters?
If I can rate my party as it relates to masses we have 97 percent. To PDP members we should go back to the drawing board to think beyond winning election because you can’t win election if you don’t work hard. This government has shown that it will go for thuggery it is no longer a story, as it happened in Gombe, Billiri, Funakaye and we don’t know which local government is next. So, wherever you are look for people, we will fight them with votes and not with weapons