At the government house Sokoto, former governor, now Senator Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko presided over a meeting with the present governor, Aminu Waziri Tambwal, including members of the state and national assembly with only one item on the agenda: protest against President Muhammadu Buhari’s nomination of Ms. Aisha Abubakar as minister representing Sokoto State for consideration by the Senate. In pursuit of the outcome of their deliberation they sent a petition to the Senate last Thursday protesting the president’s nomination.
The petitioners are claiming that Aisha Abubakar is not qualified to be a minister of the federal republic because, according to them, “due regard was not given to the intendment of the constitution which stipulates some conditions precedent as basic qualification for a nominee and also for not conforming with the principle of equality as envisaged by the constitution”.
The petitioners also hinged their objection on the fact that “Aisha Abubakar is not a card-carrying member of the APC and that indeed, her uncle, Col. Sambo Dasuki (retd), who was national security adviser under former President Goodluck Jonathan “personified efforts to ensure the victory of the PDP in Sokoto State”. What is more, Aisha’s uncle, Aminu Abubakar Alhaji,they also claimed “was the PDP candidate that lost to the now APC governor of the state, Aminu Tambuwal”. To cap their argument, Aisha, they say, cannot be considered a fair choice as minister from Sokoto State because she comes from the same federal constituency as the state governor. These are, no doubt, pedestrian, self-seeking, narrow and mundane reasons for opposing Aisha’s candidacy.
For all those at home with the politics of Sokoto, the reason of Aisha coming from the same federal constituency as the governor cannot hold given the fact that there have been antecedents which occurred when no one else but Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko was the governor of the state between 2007 and 2015.
For instance, with Wamakko coming from Sokoto Central senatorial district, Alhaji Ahmed Gusau and Dr. Haliru Hassan were at various times appointed ministers and there were no protests. By the way, was it not the same Aliyu Magatakarda Wamaakko who muscled the system to ensure that himself and his younger brother, Abdullahi Muhammed Wamakko (Abdullahi Speaker) are at the same time in the Senate and House of Representatives respectively without qualms with regards to equity in the distribution of political positions among the component localities in his constituency? Why now in the case of Aisha Abubakar? And talking of equity and equitable distribution, why should the people of Sokoto want to be treated differently from other states where ministerial nominees under the Buhari’s presidency are coming from the same constituencies with the governors? The examples here include Kaduna where Zainab Ahmed is from Kaduna North, Zaria town precisely as Governor Nasir el-Rufai and, Barr. Ocholi is from Kogi East of Igala extraction as the incumbent governor of the PDP Idris Ibrahim as well as the APC flag bearer in the soon to be held governorship election in the state, Prince Abubakar Audu?
They would want to give example of Ahmed Musa Ibeto who was allegedly substituted by President Buhari essentially because, he is from the same Niger East as Governor Abubakar Sani Bello. While the reasons for the dropping of Ibeto is still at best, a matter of speculation, the petitioners from Sokoto want us to accept as sacrosanct the practice of sacrificing merit on the altar of political expediency and narrow sentiments of vendetta, ego and short-term material benefits. Otherwise, in terms of education, exposure, sophistication, track record and moral traction, who from the lot opposed to her appointment as minister comes anywhere close to Aisha Abubakar who, by global standard is as educated, brilliant and intelligent as any woman or man can be? Perhaps, driven by the frenzy of the disdain of Aisha, the petitioners from Sokoto have soon forgotten that it was Senator Abdullah Wali that was the PDP gubernatorial candidate that contested against Aminu Waziri Tambwal and NOT Aminu Abubakar Alhaji, elder brother to Aisha, as wrongly stated in their petition
It will seem that some people are yet to understand the universal and prevailing meaning and practice of the presidential system of government as against the parliamentary system. While it is only in the latter that cabinet ministers are members of the ruling political parties or coalescing parties, ministers in the presidential system are neither necessarily members of the political parties in power or, even partisan politicians at all. Thus a president in the presidential system can decide to appoint technocrats or experts into his cabinet for the simple objective of tapping into their expertise to achieve set government goals and objectives.
The present American Secretary of the strategic Ministry of Defence is a prominent member of the opposition–the Republican Party. Under President Olusegun Obasanjo, Nasiru el-Rufa’i, Okonjo Iweala and a few others were appointed ministers solely because of their demonstrated expertise and track record and not because they were members of the ruling PDP which of course, they were not. Even in the on-going dispensation of President Muhammadu Buhari, the Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Ike Ikachukwu, now nominated and confirmed by the Senate as minister was a none partisan, none card-carrying member of the APC.
They will not come out to say it, but the truth is that opposition to Aisha Abubakar’s nomination has the undertone of male chauvinism and animosities embedded in the history of the past. People are not just comfortable with the fact that a woman is the one to represent Sokoto in the federal cabinet, a turf seen as essentially one for men. Forget the fact that the woman has those qualities that men around those championing the campaign against her do not simply posses. On the puerile ground that she is from the same federal constituency as Governor Tambuwal, observers of political currents of Sokoto State are agreed that this point would not have been raised if the nominee was a man or somebody from a particular political and socio-cultural tendency in the state.
Very importantly, while Aisha’s genealogy of being a descendant of Usman Shehu Danfodio and therefore a full blooded blue blood of Sokoto, some people are not all the same comfortable that one, and a woman for that matter, from the lineage of Buhari should be appointed to what, to some people, is a glamorous, privilege position of providing avenues for feathering the nest of themselves and cronies.
They are spreading surreptiously, the cheap, infantile, patently false campaign of calumny that, “she is not married.” And so what? In any case, Aisha Abubakar has been happily married and blessed with five children to butt. To these people, a membership of the cabinet is not an opportunity to serve, but an opportunity to ‘chop’. Anyway, President Muhammadu Buhari is appointing Aisha Abubakar as a minister of the federal republic and not a minister for Sokoto State affairs. And for that, she is competently and eminently qualified.
–Ayuba is a Kaduna based commentator and public affairs analyst