Tunde Omolehin, Sokoto
Ibrahim Almustapha Aliyu is the member-elect for Wurno/Rabbah Federal Constituency in the 9th National Assembly. Before his election, he was two-term member of the Sokoto State House of Assembly where he served as the Minority Whip, and later Deputy Leader. He speaks on his mission to the lower chamber, the need to ensure party supremacy and he quest to see to the emergence of Femi Gbajabiamila as Speaker of the House of Representatives.
As an elected member of the 9th National Assembly, what will be your focus in the lower chamber?
As provided in the 1999 constitution, the basic responsibility of a lawmaker is to make laws, represent the interest of his constituency and of course carryout oversight functions. For 16 years now, our federal constituency has been lacking good representation at the National Assembly. That does not mean there was nobody in the lower chamber but the quality of representation was poor to the extent that my people felt they have nobody in the National Assembly, that aside, now that I have been given the mandate. I will ensure that these basic things are achieved. I will work very hard in making good laws and helping to provide good governance. I will do my best to represent the interest of my people at the National Assembly. There are a lot of things that we lack especially in education, agriculture, infrastructure, and of recent, security, that require prompt action from the Federal Government. I will do my very in these areas. On the oversight, of course we are going to appropriate funds and we have to follow up to ensure that money appropriated is judiciously put into use. I will also make myself available in the promotion of good policies of the Federal Government under the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari. I know what Mr. President needs from us is the support from all Nigerians and particularly, the National Assembly which was lacking in the 8th Assembly. Mr. President has to suffer various delay tactics and unnecessary bureaucracies in the implementation of some of his good policies and programmes. So, I am going to do my best in this regard with other colleagues to ensure that the ‘next level’ is achieved.
You were elected into the Sokoto State House of Assembly twice, now you have been elected into the National Assembly. How prepared are you for the task ahead?
My first term in the state House of Assembly, I was elected the minority whip, and when I was re-elected for the second term I was elected Deputy Leader. I didn’t see it as a different task; rather I see it as a higher task. Hitherto, I was representing Rabbah constituency, but now I have Wurno and Rabbah Local Government Areas that make up the federal constituency. I was dealing with issues that have to do with state, now I will be facing a higher task of dealing with Nigeria. I want to assure you and through you assure Sokoto people that I am very much prepared for this task.
Choosing leadership of the 8th National Assembly was characterised with crisis. Did you envisage such scenario in the 9th National Assembly?
I don’t think so because we have learnt from the past. This was why immediately after we were elected, the new members of House of Representatives on the platform of the All Progressive Congress, (APC) realised that we are of larger seize. We decided to come together as one to promote unity among ourselves. We had various meetings and we are able to come up with some unified issues that will strengthen our unity in any event of the 9th National Assembly. We identified the fact that we were elected on the platform of our party, the APC. Without that platform, we can only be popular but we might find it difficult to get elected. Strong political party like APC makes it easier to get elected. We recognised the fact the party played a greater role in our making. We thought the only way to compensate the party is to respect party’s supremacy and unity. We are able to come up with resolutions that we will toe the party line as regard the quest for the leadership of the 9th National Assembly. We agreed that whoever our party decides to endorse, we will go for him. Even before now and having been an experienced person in the legislature, following the event of the 8th National Assembly, we knew those that can be trusted with the 9th National Assembly leadership. We have narrowed our search to Femi Gbajabiamila as our Speaker of the 9th National Assembly. We are happy that the party has chosen him and we will support him. With our number, as new members we are 164, and returning members are 67, and all together, we have a total number of 223 APC members. I am sure it will be a smooth ride this time around.
Similarly, we are in contact with virtually all political parties including the PDP because there are PDP members that believed in Femi Gbajabiamila. They believed in his quality leadership. This is a national issue. Nobody enjoyed what happened in the 8th National Assembly. Members could not get projects across because of the delay in the budget. Those ugly events were part of the reasons we converged as APC members and came up with this noble decision to support Gbajabiamila.
Your party leadership has presented Gbajabiamila and Senator Lawan as Speaker and Senate President respectively to lead the 9th National Assembly; you think the two will fly?
What we are after is quality leadership and the two (Femi and Senator Lawan) possessed such virtue. Secondly, the unity and supremacy of our party is paramount to us. We have to work in safeguarding these in all matters. So, we are comfortable with the party’s decision and I believe it will fly.
We, the newly elected members of the House of Representatives on the platform of the APC, came together having taken into cognisance our numerical strength, we decided to form a forum known as APC New Rep-Elected Forum. Coordinators were nominated across the zones, and I was given the mandate to coordinate the North West zone. We held series of meetings and we have been able to come up with a lot of common grounds; among these is to uphold the party supremacy, toe the party line and support the president to ensure that the ‘next level’ agenda is achieved. So we have the numerical strength in the APC to ensure Gbajabiamila’s emergence as Speaker.
On Sokoto politics, your party won majority seats at both the national and state assembly elections but lost the governorship. What do you think went wrong?
Well, this question should be a puzzle to all and sundry. How can a party that performed well in the presidential election, given the gap of over 150,000 votes as margin to beat PDP’s presidential candidate, won all the three senatorial seats in the state, won nine out of 11 House of Representatives seats and 16 out of 30 seats in the state assembly lose the governorship? This is the big question that everybody must give answer to. But whatever happens, at the end of an election, a winner must be announced before the right thing is done. I think that was what happened in Sokoto State. Right now, we are already in court to correct the wrong.
Recently, your party alleged political intimidation within the civil service by the state government. How genuine is this allegation?
It is unfortunate that such ugly scenario is still unfolding in Sokoto State in this 21st century. When other states are advancing politically, Sokoto is still playing political victimisation and other ugly things that can cause political disunity among the peace loving people of the state. When other states are settling down after the elections to see how meaningful development can be attracted to the people, when the governors are working very hard to convince the electorate on how best to deliver on their campaign promises, in Sokoto State, some people are reducing the art of governance by indulging in political victimisation. Politics is not madness. As a leader in the state, you must not reduce yourself or allow your people to exhibit such act of disunity in the state. Although, to be fair to the governor, he has come out on the social media platform to deny that he wasn’t a party to such intimidation, he is duty bound to urgently call those who are responsible to order and serve them the necessary punishment. If these things continue, given the equation of almost 50-50 of voters that decided the election, others could revolt against this ugly trend of political intimidation by the PDP -led government. But we have been telling our supporters to be calm in the face of all these travails.
At the end of your tenure as a member of the lower house, what kind of legacy would you wish to leave behind?
I will like to be remembered as somebody who gave himself to his country to serve humanity, and also as a dedicated legislator with passion for his people’s welfare and manpower development.