The Bauchi State Governor Mallam Isa Yuguda, monday, sacked over 2,000 of his political aids.
This was contained in a statement by the Permanent secretary, political affairs, government house, Hashimu Yakubu, on behalf of the Secretary to the state government. Affected are Special assistants, senior special assistants and personal assistants. The sack is with immediate effect.
Although the actual number of affected persons was not mentioned in the government statement but sources close to the government revealed that they might be well over 2,000.
Wait a minute. 2,000 advisers and assistants to one man alone and he is not Caesar Augustus nor Alexander the great or Pharaoh. Just a governor of a state. 2,000 special advisers and the state is not yet a blurry replica of Hong Kong or Las Vegas??
What are they advising and assisting? How many economic sectors does a state have? And going by the report, these are just political advisers oh!
Also going by the information obtained, the sack does not include the special Adviser Due process and other aides working directly with the governor and his deputy. So who were these 2,000 plus extraneous aides working for?
This has further revealed the extent of profligacy and recklessness of our so called public servants in handling of states funds and government. The creation and assignment of offices and appointments has become a medium of settlement, of favor reciprocation and reward for loyalty to the "oga at the top". It has become tradition for government executives to create and disburse offices just for the purpose of rewarding, compensating, accommodating, fixing, settling and recompensing certain individuals within there family, social and political circle. We are in an era where, someone does me a favor, or worked for me as the governor of the state and want to pay him back on a permanent long term basis, all I have to do is create a useless office and appoint the said person to oversee it,
They create these offices which are often unnecessary and extraneous, and strap the burden of funding them on the government. Little wonder the step preponderance of the cost of funding government over the cost of funding capital projects in the country as elucidated by the Oronsaye report which revealed that the government uses 70 percent of the yearly budget to fund governance / recurrent expenditure while just 30 percent is used for funding of capital projects. How then can there be enough money to build schools, hospitals, roads, provide water, health facilities and improve the epileptic power generation which has been like a malnourished infant since independence.
Only the money that the president spends on his kitchen combined with the inundated flow of monies transversing the national assembly, both the upper and lower house in a year is enough money to build two refineries and solve the energy need of the country once and for all.
But how can we achieve that when a governor has 2,000 aides, when governors and senate/rep leaders who are not civil servants gets to receive pensions for life, with packages tantamount of being a governor for life. To think that the Bauchi state governor is carrying out this sack just barely a month to the expiration of his spell as governor of the state calls for suspension and questioning. Is it that one month to the end of his spell as governor of the state he suddenly realize that he doesn't need these more than necessary counselors or he just found out the uselessness of their office? Or is he just venting frustration over his defeat at the just concluded senatorial elections on his political team mates who failed to handle their wings, deliver their jurisdiction, hence the lose?
One will only wonder.
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