In 2023 eventually, there will be votes for selfish individuals, groups, interests and Jigawa. However, a valid vote for Mustapha Sule Lamido is a vote for Sule Lamido, and a vote for Sule Lamido is a vote for genuine development. Who will dare not vote for Jigawa’s development?
His name is Alhaji Mustapha Sule Lamido, a son to the former governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Sule Lamido, the political warrior who conquered the state from rural to modern empire; the desirable leader of all times who revived the confidence of the people regarding governmental decadence; the esteemed statesman whose developmental output overwhelmed his words as a governor.
If Jigawans were to choose between a government without Lamido and a government with Lamido, they would not hesitate to vouch for the latter. This is owing to the fact that Lamido’s phenomenal effects on the good people of Jigawa are still fresh in our memories and will continue to serve as development case studies. We shall never forget how his timely revolution erupted to completely alter the face of Jigawa to enhance our concerted jocundity and was thus able to balance the development equation between Jigawa and the other relatively developed states through the effective tool of result oriented leadership. Between possibilities and impossibilities therefore, Sule Lamido kept a date with the former to serve as a great lesson to all generational leaders.
Only recently, Alhaji Mustapha Lamido was overwhelmingly picked as the PDP candidate to contest the governorship election in 2023. What this signifies is that if elected into office, he will consolidate on the marvelous performance of his father and leave a befitting legacy just like his father did on a very large scale. To our bewilderment, his father was able to walk the talk so that Jigawa actually worked and many outsiders talked about it using the language of envy.
Interestingly and up to now, Alhaji Sule Lamido has no expressed aversion to his son’s political adventure as he wishes for another round of advancement in which he will have an active role to display and place Jigawa on the development map again. Albeit there are vehement oppositions to Mustapha’s aspiration, it is just a matter of time that the political reality will unfold itself to justify his political relevance . It is then that the famous dreamers will wake up from their deep slumber with no fruitful option other than joining the potentially political bandwagon.
Prior to and after his emergence as the PDP candidate, Mustapha Sule Lamido who also holds the traditional title of San Turaki has been under fierce attacks from political foes and will continue to face the criticisms of the critics for which he ought to remain resilient, refilling the bag of patience with steadfastness and focus. According to their unanimous as well as feckless analysis,
he is such a too young chap to be a governor, blah, blah, blah! Others have jointly propelled the unpopular verdict that he lacks exposure and is very poor in administrative skills. But his ardent fans have always defended him with cogent reasons, pointing out that former governors Ali Sa’ad Birnin Kudu and Ibrahim Saminu Turaki were even younger than him when they ruled the state and both had very limited experience in matters of administration when they were wielding power.
Amidst this funny controversy therefore, a growing school of thought has it that San Turaki’s election into the office of the governor will be tremendous blessings to the people of Jigawa State. The proponents of this argument confidently contend that San Turaki will be closely monitored and guided by his father to do the needful considering the fact that Alhaji Sule Lamido is a true servant of the people and loves Jigawa at the extreme bottom of his heart as he was able to make it winner among winners, raising it from inferior to superior level. Among the undisputed evidence for this are the massive infrastructures that he fixed on the ground. They are and will continue to be the indelible milestones in the evolution of Jigawa State.
In addition, these political thinkers have profound that beyond the ‘political heritage’ propaganda lies the workable theory of ‘development: a paradigm shift’ in which the father will provide the plans and the son will execute them so that Jigawa shall rise again above the sea level. This point is significant because when Sule Lamido completed his second tenure, his rosy dreams for a greater Jigawa were largely unfulfilled as his revolutionary agenda untimely came to a halt in 2015 to our biggest disappointment.
We can give the doubting Thomases a chance to expound their disbelief, but the fact remains that Sule Lamido will serve as a competent watchdog of his son’s political adventure just as his son will not deviate from the honourable path of his father to attain a similar fame. It promises to be a mutual collaboration between the senior Lamido and the junior Lamido as well as a corroboratively political experiment that will be tested and by Allah’s grace be trusted for Jigawa’s accelerated boosting. Apparently, Sule Lamido has not retired from his unflinching jingoism for Jigawa State and by his son’s victory in 2023 with Allah’s immense support, Jigawans will continue to count the advancement indices that will rejuvenate, uplifting the state to greater heights once again.
Massive support for Mustapha Lamido in 2023 will be a recounting of the prolific past when Sule Lamido was at the helm of affairs. A victory for him will ultimately be a triumph for Jigawa because it will be reinvigorated to reclaim its rightful position in the scheme of developmental affairs. The emergence of San Turaki will be the re- enactment of Sule Lamido’s progressive leadership that was and is still the hope of the hopeless, the defence of the defenceless and the voice of the voiceless. It was an action-parked government that produced ideas in abundance to reform Jigawa and it is still the yearning of the people of Jigawa to once again unlock development potentialities.
Sule Lamido was eventually proud that Jigawans could raise their heads high and declared that they were proud of Jigawa. Surprisingly and on assumption of duty, he had categorically stated that within just two years of his administration, the people of the state would be proud of it! To consolidate on that glorious past therefore, another opportunity is now knocking on our door. It is either we betray it or fulfill it. After all, Frantz Fanon warns that we must discover our mission and fulfill it or betray it.
This political fraternity of father and son vis-a-vis Jigawa’s yearnings and aspirations will produce surprise packages the way the gang of the prophets of doom will detest them. These reactionaries are extremely detrimental to the state prosperity and can subvert our progress. For Sule Lamido, he has every political right to elevate the status of Jigawa via his son as long as it is his life ambition towards our collective gains. From Sule Lamido to Mustapha Lamido therefore, it goes beyond the political reaction of ‘heritage’, for it must never be allowed to become a notorious barrier to ‘developmental action’, because the state cannot afford a colossal loss. Between Sule Lamido and Mustapha Sule Lamido are thus mixed abilities in which the latter is endowed with elevated style of leadership to be transferred to the former who is young and vibrant to translate ideas into actions.
In an ailing nation that breeds more political opportunists than political servants, we have not forgotten how Sule Lamido selflessly served Jigawa beyond recognition in absolute aversion to opportunism. As such, the political will he deployed to ignite the campaigns of progress for Jigawa will definitely and fundamentally be redeployed to ginger and orient Mustapha Sule Lamido so that Jigawa state will once more pass through the system of Lamidocracy which can be defined as the government of the progressives by the progressives and for the progressives. In this context, Lamido ensured that every segment of the society was progressively constructed to move Jigawa forward. Jigawa then was metaphorically and organically a progressive element that captured millions of hearts within and outside!
In 2023 eventually, there will be votes for selfish individuals, groups, interests and Jigawa. However, a valid vote for Mustapha Sule Lamido is a vote for Sule Lamido, and a vote for Sule Lamido is a vote for genuine development. Who will dare not vote for Jigawa’s development?