By Ishaya Ibrahim
On May 29, 2019, when Babagana Zulum took the oath of office as the governor of Borno State, the odds were stacked against him.
Borno state was and is still the epicentre of terrorism in Nigeria. Agriculture, which is the economic mainstay, is disrupted by terrorism. A large chunk of the state’s revenue goes into security-related matters, leaving little for infrastructure and the welfare of the people. And of course, the poverty level of the state stands at about 70 per cent, far above the national average of 46 per cent. But those odds have not stopped Zulum in making a real difference in the lives of the people for the nine months he has been in office.
Zulum, a professor of Water Engineering, has shown by his speech and actions what it takes to lead in the 21st century – Knowledge, courage and compassion. The blend of all three has set him apart from his predecessors who have occupied that same seat and had better odds.
Even ardent critics of the All Progressives Congress (APC), which is Zulum’s political party, have some nice words for the Borno governor.
“There are two Governors in the north that are outstanding. The first is Governor Mutawale of Zamfara. And the second is Governor Zullum of Borno State. Despite my reservations about core northern leaders generally, these two young men are outstanding. Both are filled with zeal and courage,” former minister of Aviation and a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had said.
It took only two months of Zulum’s administration to know the nature of the man, his ability to exercise control over whatever has been put under his care.
In Borno government hospital, and like many government-owned hospitals in Nigeria, patients are usually left unattended to at night by doctors, who are either on their private practice or sleeping at home.
On one Monday night in July 2019, the governor paid an unscheduled visit to one of the state-owned general hospitals to find out how the health facility was being run. He found out that four resident doctors, who were an on-call duty that night were not on seat.
He got their phone numbers from the nurses and tried calling some of them but none picked their calls or showed up till he left the hospital.
The governor later summoned the head of the hospital who could not give a clear explanation of why his subordinates were absent. He suspended the head of the hospital, Dr Audu Usman, for the failure of leadership and also suspended the absentee doctors.
The action of the governor must have resonated with other doctors in the state to learn to take their work ethics seriously.
Zulum must have understood as an engineer that a defective part in a machine leads to machine failure. Conversely, if certain sectors in Borno state are not working, it means his government has failed.
The governor also knows how to motivate dedicated workers. When on February 7, he visited a primary school, he obviously didn’t go there to catch latecomers. After all, teachers in most schools resume by 7 am and he was there at 6:30 am. So, he probably must have been there to motivate those who were exceptionally punctual.
The governor might have known that being a Friday, many teachers would likely report late to work or be absent altogether, perhaps, for a weekend trip. But not Obiageli Mazi, the lone teacher in the school at that time. She got a double gift that day – an undisclosed amount of cash and promotion from a class teacher to assistant headmistress.
On the security front, the governor refused to be a chief security officer in name only. He personally supervised the activities of the military deployed to quell the insurgency in his state. Where he found that they are wrong, he offers a rebuke as he did on January 5 at a military checkpoint where he accused the military and police of collecting N1,000 from travellers who do not have the national identity cards.
The governor visited the Maiduguri-Damaturu highway where thousands of travellers were stranded because security officials manning the highway locked it down.
Upon reaching the Maiduguri entrance checkpoint, located near the Borno State University, the governor met hundreds of vehicles queued up on both sides of the lanes.
“This is unacceptable,” Zulum said on the top of his voice.
“How can you subject people to this kind of torture all in the name of National ID card? And you are all here collecting N500 and N1,000 from poor travellers who don’t have a national ID card.”
A soldier tried to offer some explanation, but the governor said: “No this is not right. The federal government has not created an enabling environment for our people to get their national ID cards and you are here collecting N500 and N1000 as a fine for not having what the federal government has not provided for all.”
Zulum has shown himself to be a problem solver. When many people in the state were coming down with kidney failure, he did not behave like the former governor of Zamfara State, Abdulaziz Yari, who had said it was the sin of the people that had caught up with them following the outbreak of Meningitis in 2017. For Zulum, he asked researchers to help find the cause of the high rate of kidney failure.
While many hold the opinion that Nigeria is not so blessed with great leaders, Zulum appears to be an exception.
