Ken Ugbechie

Fear is the enemy of mortal man. Fear kills before the real death comes stalking. Fear has a spirit, it makes the heart of an otherwise strong man go weak, some times the strong man may even freak out. In recent weeks, Nigerian editors were put to test, not deliberately though, but that singular decision brought to the fore the reality that editors in spite of their legendary boldness to publish and be damned also love their lives.

And what was the decision? The Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE), the apex body of professional journalists in the country decided to hold its yearly conference in Katsina.  The annual festival of ideas and discourses has held in several states in southern Nigeria and a sprinkling of northern states. Delta, Akwa Ibom, Edo, Bayelsa have played hosts to this event, same for Abuja, Kaduna and Bauchi states.

This time round, guided by the indication of interest of Governor Ibrahim Shehu Shema of Katsina to host and the enthusiasm of the editors to demonstrate the true pan-Nigerianness of the Guild, the executive of the NGE chose Katsina as the 2014 host of the event. However, it must be explained that by 2013 when the decision was reached, Boko Haram insurgency was only concentrated in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa on the north eastern fringes of the country. Neighbouring states to Katsina, namely Kano and Kaduna, were yet to be hit by the Boko Haram scourge.  Katsina State itself has always been peaceful and still remains one of the safest states in Nigeria but the very fact that you cannot do a direct flight to the state, which, again, has one of the best airports in the country with a clean, aircraft-friendly runway, means you have to fly to Kano with all its risk and do the rest of the journey to Katsina by road. When editors elected to go to Katsina last year, bombs were not commonplace in the malls and streets of Kano. Female teenagers were not used as conduits for improvised explosive devices (IEDs). You could therefore excuse the editors for wanting to postpone the All Nigerian Editors Conference (ANEC 2014). The issue was never the safety of editors in Katsina but how to access this all-important state reputed for its contribution to the political and judicial development of the nation.

In the midst of much anxiety, it was resolved that editors converge on Katsina for the conference and we did, some via Kano and others via a chartered flight to Katsina.  It would have been tragic if editors did not hold this conference in Katsina because as it turned out, Katsina held in its bowels a rare hospitality and peaceful ambience. It was an opportunity for Nigerian editors to assess the performance of Shema. Their verdict? Shema is working and Katsina is transforming.  From good roads to housing, potable water to a booming agriculture scheme involving youths, from improved educational facilities to capacity building for teachers and civil servants in the state, Shema has wrought development in diverse sectors.

But among his peers, Shema stands out for his commitment to quality education. Shema, a lawyer and business administrator, seems to have come to terms with the place of education in the liberation of a people. Katsina never used to rank high in the quality education index of the country but Shema has changed that unworthy profile with his unflinching zeal to develop the capacity of his people.  “We take education seriously because education is the soul of society. Democracy cannot thrive in an unenlightened society. This is why my administration spent over N11billion Naira to complete the Umaru Musa Yar’Adua University. We also built 34 Girl Child Primary Schools, Constructed 260 Conventional Secondary Schools and over 100 Primary Schools. Education is not only free in the state at all levels, but the government also pays the WAEC, NABTEB and NECO fees for all students. The Government has also sponsored 700 students abroad for different courses”, he told the nearly 250 editors who thronged the state for the conference.

Northern governors and indeed governors across the country would need to copy the Shema template for youth development and management. Shema has engaged the youths of the state, including persons with disability, as active players in agriculture, arts and craft and education in a manner that it is very difficult, if not impossible, to recruit them into the army of terror. Little wonder, Katsina has been immune from the pang of terror that has ravaged some parts of the north including Abuja.

The state Youth Craft Village has trained over 5,000 students in 18 different trades such as computer maintenance and networking, GSM repairs, auto-mechanic and electronics, leather works, film-making and photography among others. The government has also constructed a standard 35, 000-seater stadium to ensure the physical development of the youth.

The over seven years of Shema has produced a harvest of tangible development in physical infrastructure but to many of the editors, the most outstanding achievement of his government is the emphasis on human capital development and affordable yet qualitative healthcare.  Any visitor to Katsina would be struck at the cleanliness of the state and the deliberate attempt to keep its youth busy.

In the face of these monumental achievements, Shema remains coy and unwilling to blow his trumpet. More admirable, he refused to join the infamous club of Nigerian governors who borrow for frivolities. “To execute these projects and new ones initiated by this administration, we did not borrow a kobo. I repeat we did not borrow a kobo, from the inception of this administration in 2007 to date. We used the money of the state to develop the state. We also pay N240 million every month as pension and have implemented N18,000 minimum wage, using the best scale in the country as testified by state and national labour leaders. Workers in the state get their salary between 22^nd– and 25^th of every month”, he told the editors.