Why do you want to be the governor of Kogi State?
I want to be Kogi State governor for a lot of obvious reasons. Over the years, particularly in the last three and a half years, I have seen human and infrastructural decay in the state. It is no more news that salaries are no longer paid, neither is it news that pensioners do not get their benefits. Our health and education sectors are all in shambles. Our infrastructure has gone comatose, there is so much that needs attention that is not given the necessary attention. When you see things like that, and you are patriotic as a citizen of the state, you cannot but try to do something to salvage the situation. So, for this reason, and so many others, I decided to run for the governorship of the state.
But there is an insinuation that your father, Ibrahim Idris, who was elected governor of Kogi State on the PDP platform in April 2003, and re-elected on March 29, 2008, asked you to run or wants to impose you on the party and the state?
This is ridiculous. It might interest you to know that my brother ran for the House of Representatives for three local governments. Now if my father did not impose my brother to run for the House of Representatives, but allowed free and fair primary and main elections, why then will he impose me on the party and the state?
Your fathers ruled the state from May 29, 2003, to 2007 and from 2008 to January 2012 and as you said, your brother is a House of Reps member, and you want to run for the governorship of the state. Are your father and your family trying to have a political dynasty in the state?
It is not a political dynasty! One thing you should ask is: Does the constitution allow me to run? I am entitled to run? I am old and educated enough to run? Do I possess the necessary requirements to run? If all these questions have affirmative answers, I do not see any reason why I cannot exercise my constitutional right to run as a citizen of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Moreover, it might interest you to know that there are two sons of other governors that are also running for this election. And so is the son of a former national chairman (of PDP) but nobody is raising an eyebrow over their running. So, I wonder why mine should be so spectacular.
But there is an insinuation that your father converted some resources that belonged to Kogi State to his private empire and they are afraid that you could also toe the same path?
Life is beautiful, thanks to Information Technology and investigative journalism. If there was anything of the sort, I am sure you journalists would have been able to find out. It may interest you to know that during my father’s nine years as governor, he never took a loan from any bank or any financial institution whatsoever. And if there is, I will only be too glad to know and of course, the generality of the people would want to know which bank or financial institutions, the date and time. With the little resources that came to the state, he was able to pay salaries and pensions, harmonise salaries, do infrastructure, upgrade our university, build roads and over 1,000 housing units. His achievements are so vast. If he was able to do all that with so little, and not collect a loan, you will agree with me that such was spectacular and he had done well.
What are your proposed programmes and policies if you become the governor?
I have quite a lot of programmes. Kogi is a state blessed with arable land, and we have lots of mineral resources. Also, it is a haven for untapped tourism potential. Added to that, we have huge human resources. Can you imagine what our combination will be in terms of development when you have the manpower just waiting to be tapped? And you also imagine when you have vast arable land, mineral resources and big investors come into the state? We can do a lot. I am an agriculturist; my first degree was in Agriculture. Kogi happens to have cashew. Last year, over $100m worth of cashew was exported out of Nigeria. About 70 per cent of that came from Kogi. And what did we do? We just simply removed the nuts, packaged them and sold to middlemen. So can we imagine what we will be able to do if a situation warrants us to be able to do the sorting of our nuts? Why do we sort the nuts? To give it a grade; because the better the grade, the higher the price. Do you realise that involves manpower? So you are getting to employing our youths. Not only that, we are talking about the washing of our cashews. It will interest you to know that cashew nuts are acidic, so even washing them will involve manpower. Then getting investors into the state to run like a public-private partnership whereby the state tends to give tax holidays and other incentives for the investors. What do you get in all of these? You have an upgrading of your crop. Secondly, you have greater employment for the teeming youth and thirdly, you have just increased your internally generated revenue for the state.
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You are going to contest against a former governor of the state, Capt Idris Wada (retd); a sitting senator, Dino Melaye, and other notable politicians in the PDP from Kogi State, what are your chances of clinching the ticket of the party?
Honestly, I am going into it with the aim to win, but in the event that I did not win, my concern is not personal, it is about the state. So for me, anything that will make the state better, I am for it. It is not about me, it is about Kogi State, it is about our people. Whoever wins so long as he will develop the state and bring smiles to the people, has my support.
What are your qualifications?
On educational qualification, I have a first degree in agriculture. I have a Post-Graduate Diploma in Management, I have a Masters in International Affairs and Diplomacy. From my primary school education to masters, all were done in Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, except my secondary school. Outside that, I have been running my own business for a decade now. Outside being a farmer, I have concessions in the mining industry which means I am also a miner. I have business interests in oil and gas. Thirdly, I come from a political family. So a mix of all these three provides me with enough qualification to be able to run the state. Also, I am still young enough. I am 51.
Abubakar Audu
What is motivating you to run for the governorship of Kogi State?
In recent years, the people of Kogi State have been living in squalor. The whole state has been turned to an almost a very uninspiring environment. Investments in human capital development and commercial activities are at an all-time low. There is nothing that inspires confidence in many sectors of the state that is worth looking at or what investing in. The people in the public sector are also suffering the consequences of non-payment of salaries. That actually is the tonic that serves as a catalyst for economic activities in the state. If this tonic is not let into the system, the state lags behind in almost every aspect.
My motivation for running is to take the people out of this situation and bring Kogi State back to the path of positive development. The only thing you hear about Kogi State of recent is negative news.
What are your proposed programmes for the state?
The first thing we will do is to ensure that we make the youth of the state very productive. The youth are not inspired for productivity. They have no motivation to go into farming, mining or any kind of business because there is no access to capital in the first place. There is no know-how, no proper education, no vocational training. We are going to address all these things and bring the youth back to the path of creativity, development and progress.
In terms of infrastructure, what do you intend to do?
We will look at providing critical infrastructure. We will not allow the current decay of our roads. We will source for funds to ensure that our roads are motorable. We have one key advantage that successive governments have not leveraged. We are the gateway to the North and South. Most vehicles going to the South go through our state and most vehicles going to the North go through our state. So, our roads are the most important and most critical in our nation. We must fix them and we must make sure that the roads are self-sustaining.
Kogi is experiencing security challenges, what do you intend to achieve in this area?
On the security challenges, I do not believe the current claims by the governor that he has invested a lot to arrest the current insecurity in the state. We still have kidnapping, armed robbery and different kinds of crimes going on. If you do not engage the youth constructively, if you do not have a local government that is governed by the people who are elected by the people themselves, you will not have trust. You must immediately allow the local authorities to be able to be manned by people that the rest of the people in the society have confidence in.
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What do you think qualifies you to run for the governorship of the state?
I am an adult. I have 25 years of experience in business and work. I also have 20 years’ experience in politics. I have been in every political campaign organisation of my late father from 1988 till date. And I have closely observed the way he ran affairs of the state. I have experience in critical areas like infrastructure development; that is part of the business I do for a living. I am also experienced in the areas of accounting, hospitality and creating a small-scale business which is a major tonic for improving the economy. I have a flair for that and I think I will be able to do very well if we introduce a very serious micro-economic financial scheme into our local environment to ensure that traders, farmers, artisans have access to some form of capital one way or the other so that their livelihood can be enhanced.
Your father ruled the state between 1992 and 1993 and between 1999 and 2003. He also made an attempt to rule again. Unfortunately, he died on November 22, 2015, before the result of the election was announced. Now, you want to rule the state, don’t you think people may think you want to create a political dynasty?
My relationship with people who have governed the state before shouldn’t matter. What I think the state is looking for is the best man for the job. My curriculum vitae is not the fact that my father is the late Prince Abubakar Audu. That is not part of my CV. The only part of my CV where I mentioned him is where I had to write my name. Outside that, I am running on my own experience. Yes, even politically, I learnt from him but of course, somebody has to tutor somebody and I am grateful for the lessons I learnt from him. Those lessons made me who I am. I think I am running on merit. I am not running on the fact that my father ran and could not complete that tenure. No! Yahaya Bello, unfortunately, has completed that tenure. Now we are running to give Kogi State a new life.
Did your father really impact positively on the state as some people felt he converted part of the state resources to his personal empire?
The highest money he ever got as a state governor was N800m monthly. The state university came out from it, a lot of roads, hospitals and schools came out of it. Obajana Cement Company and a lot of water projects, as well as rural electrification, came out from that. If you see the evidence of the work done, why then would one think that way when there are people now who earn N3bn to N4bn monthly and we do not even have a road to show for it. People should not propagate that kind of information but should praise whoever has done well.
Are you not scared that a former governor of the state, Capt Idris Wada (Retd.), though from the PDP is vying and also somebody who shares the same political advantage you have, Abubakar Idris, is also vying for the same position?
We have no obstacle, going by the candidates that will be provided by the PDP. While I have tremendous and fatherly respect for Capt Wada for being the man that he is and for being someone who once ran against my own father, I am up against any of them. It is 100 per cent victory for the APC. This is because the people have kept the faith with APC, and with the Audu political structure: it is the largest political structure in Kogi State