As Kano decides….

Also published in Daily Trust

A fortnight ago we looked forward to seeing who would win the fiercely contested presidential election between the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan and Muhammadu Buhari, while the parliamentary elections conducted simultaneously with the presidential election added to the unprecedented political hustle and bustle in the country.

Now that the presidential election is over, our attention has shifted to the gubernatorial and state assembly elections, which take place tomorrow. Also unlike during the presidential election, our concentrations now largely and predictably focus on the local politics within our respective states.

It is in light of this that this column today focuses on the politics of my home state, Kano especially as it relates to the gubernatorial election and the two main contenders i.e. Malam Salihu Sagir Takai of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Dr Abdullahi Umar Ganduje of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Interestingly enough, the ongoing Ganduje-Takai political tussle is a continued manifestation of the persistent political rivalry between the two main political heavyweights in the state i.e. the incumbent governor Dr Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso who has anointed and heavily supports the former, and the current Minister of Education and former governor, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau who practically chose the latter from among his most faithful political loyalists to run for governor.

However, as a non-partisan bakano, I believe that the political affiliation of whoever becomes Kano State governor hardly, if at all, matters. What, instead, matters is the eventual emergence of a visionary governor progressive enough to emulate governor Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso, complete the yet-to-be completed Kwankwaso-initiated capital development projects; conceive and execute more sustainable infrastructure projects and accelerate the rate of socio-economic growth in the state.

By the way, though governor Kwankwaso’s achievements are sometimes exaggerated, he has nonetheless been able to stand out from most of the successive Kano state governors who have governed the state at various times over the decades including himself in his first tenure from 1999 to 20003. His current remarkable tenure is to a large extent comparable with the tenures of the two best-performing governors in the history of the state i.e. late Audu Bako and late Alhaji Muhammad Abubakar Rimi respectively.

Anyway, though both Malam Takai and Dr Ganduje had been career civil servants before joining politics where they have since then held different public offices, it is rather difficult to objectively identify any specific leadership qualities and/or potential that make either of them more qualified for the job than the other. Yet, as the contest remains limited between them since none of the other candidates is likely to pose any considerable challenge to either of the two main candidates, I would examine the chances of either candidate against each other.

Obviously, as deputy governor who also enjoys the support of governor’s power of incumbency and is also favoured by the phenomenal Buhari factor, Dr Ganduje is likely to win the election barring any major turn of events, which, after all, cant’ be completely ruled out especially in view of the inherent unpredictability of the politically unpredictable Kanawa.

However, the formidability of Dr. Ganduje’s opponent i.e. Malam Takai who counts on the popularity of his political mentor, former governor Ibrahim Shekarau, can’t be underestimated either. This is even though Malam Shekarau’s popularity has considerably declined over the past few years partly due to his defection to the increasingly detested PDP, and partly due to governor Kwankwaso’s impressive performance in his current tenure, which overshadows Shekarau’s eight consecutive years in office and exposes the failure of his administration to give priority to the provision of adequate infrastructure and projects for sustainable socio-economic development.

Besides, though politically motivated manipulation of religion by some Kano politicians has decreased following Kanawa’s obvious disappointment with most of the public officers elected due to their real or perceived religiosity, Mallam Takai, who is generally considered religious, still enjoys considerable support among many kanawa on such ground, while many others however doubt his ability to perform any better than the other seemingly religious-minded politicians whose performances turned out to be largely disappointing.

Moreover, Malam Takai also counts on the votes of many aggrieved APC members who have vowed to undermine Ganduje’s chances by voting for him (i.e. Takai) to settle political scores with Ganduje’s boss, Kwankwaso who they accuse of hijacking the party and discriminating against any non-Kwankwasiyya faction member within the party.

There are also many other aggrieved vested interests and individuals who would vote for Takai not necessarily because he is more qualified than Ganduje but simply because they hope that he would reverse some reforms, regulatory measures and policies, which Kwankwaso has introduced or simply revived and imposed, which they however consider too harsh. This is even though such measures are actually indispensible in the process of maintaining social order in all civilized societies around the world.

In any case, whoever wins the election will definitely face huge challenges of having to live up to Kanawa’s increasingly high expectations especially with regard to the need for the continued provision of critical infrastructure and public services where the outgoing governor Kwankwaso has performed reasonably well.