The Senator representing Niger South, Mustapha Sani has called on the former Governor of Niger state, Babangida Aliyu and his cohorts to busy themselves with their corruption cases in court, instead of ‘dreaming’ to stage a comeback.
The Senator said this while reacting to a statement credited to Mr Aliyu, who reportedly called APC a hunger-spreading party which had no any achievement, during a political rally held weekend at Agaie in Niger state.
In a statement sent to DAILY NIGERIAN, the Senator said Nigeria’s resources are no longer for a few people but for every Nigerian, thus, the governor should have ‘stuck to his display of shamelessness’.
The statement read in part: “Although the whole of Niger knows the former governor as a pathological liar and a deceptive leader, it is on the heels of this that I deem it necessary to tap him from his hallucinations and also set the record straight for the understanding of all and sundry.”
The Senator recalled that between 2007 and 2015 when Mr Aliyu was the governor of Niger state, the state was allocated the sum of about N672 billion from the federation account, but not much was however achieve in the state.
“With this huge sum, including the billions of naira of external borrowing and the ones raised from the sales of government’s properties, one would expect a monumental infrastructural and human development in the state.
“But at the end of the day, the state rather became grossly under-developed, the people became poorer than Aliyu met them.
“Institutional structures were in various states of extreme decay and the state tottering in debts that many generations of the people of the state have to struggle to settle,” Mr Sani noted.
The Senator further said that under the incumbent governor, Sani Bello who is barely three years in office, fortunes of the state have totally changed, “in spite of the relatively low allocations that have been accruing to the state, compared to during Aliyu’s administration.
“Aliyu sent many pensioners to early graves by not settling their entitlements. Bello has settled that bestiality.
“During Aliyu, almost all the roads in Niger state were totally unmotorable, yet our people had no choice other than to ply them at the risk of their lives and goods. Bello is making sure that the roads are getting rehabilitated or totally reconstructed.
“Suleja-Minna road, Kontagora-Makera road, Kontagora-Rijau road, Kagara-Kaduna road and Bida-Minna road are proud examples, not to talk of the construction of new roads and rehabilitation of new ones in Minna, Bida, Suleja and other urban areas in the state.
“Rehabilitation will begin on Lambata-Lapai-Bida road in a matter of weeks, thanks to my intervention as a member of Senate Committee on Works. No PDP Senator could bring such a gargantuan project to the state.
Mr Sani however said that the former governor is an intellectual who should know the importance of education to development.
The Senator however said the governor “gave only a disdainful consideration to education in the state during his administration, hence the rot he allowed to fester in the sector.
“But secondary and primary schools in Niger state are now wearing new good and 21st century looks, courtesy of Governor Bello’s Whole School Rehabilitation policy.
“In the past, one would not wish even his enemy’s child to learn in the classrooms in some of our schools.
“Niger has also suddenly become a choice investments haven, unlike in Governor Aliyu days, and the state is enjoying an IGR that is unprecedented, besides the rank of unemployment that has impressively reduced,” he noted.
On his constituency, the Senator said in the history of the zone, Niger South, no Senator had ever executed physical projects that have impact on the lives of the people the way I have done in only two years. And APC is my party.
“From Lapai to Mokwa, within two years, I executed almost 50 projects. The people for whose use I executed them are now using them and can testify.
“They are all also on ground for everybody to see. The projects range from rural electrification, urban power-consolidation, quality heatlcare delivery, provision of potable water and renovation of schools to consolidate the programme of the state government.
“These are beside the scholarships I have been issuing in their thousands, the ICT trainings and skill acquisition programmes.
“The people of Niger State know that APC in Niger state, as it in the centre, are only out on a rescue mission from PDP’s sixteen years of violations.
“The people know that in just two years, APC has performed excellently and the performance is far beyond what PDP did in 16 years, right from the federal to local government level,” he concluded.
