The Heart Of The Jigawa Summit

By Timawus Mathias

It grieves me that the vital issues of the recent Economic and Investment Summit painstakingly planned and executed by the Jigawa State Government got lost completely in the politics of the country.

All of the country’s newspapers save this one (Daily Trust) led their reporting with the theme of the summit in mind. “Obasanjo tasks leaders on social and economic development”, the paper reported. All others seemed to have noticed only the encomiums from former President Obasanjo to Governor of Jigawa State, Sule Lamido.

On a bench I snuggled to find manageable comfort and finger through the few national dailies, in Birnin Kudu, Jigawa State where my son had struck a friendship with a unique cobbler Mohammed Yusuf. Mohammed Yusuf is a man who has conquered severe odds and given his life a new meaning. Although he was not an attendant at the Jigawa Economic Summit, issues there have everything to do with him. Mohammed Yusuf was born without functioning legs.

At his age (looks in early 50s), he cannot master the use of the wooded rollers that young ones like him are so adept at. A padded piece of tyre fitted firmly to his shorts enables him to use his hands as legs as well, and gets by.

Six years ago, Mohammed Yusuf was a beggar on the streets of Birnin Kudu and was one of thousands that attended the Jigawa Talakawa Summit, where he shared with thousands like him, what those who rule over him could do to change his life. Over his transistor radio, he heard days later that begging, his livelihood had been banned! He was to register as a vulnerable member of the society and earn N7,000 as monthly stipend. Yusuf never believed what the radio was telling. But he went to the Local Government and registered. He chanced begging for the rest of the month. On invitation, he returned to the Local Government and lo and behold, he was listed and paid along with many like him, N7,000 as promised. Furthermore he was interviewed to choose a skill, and he listed for shoe making.

Today Mohammed Yusuf has a fully occupied cobbler’s shop making products he has no use for - fine high quality designed and decorated Moroccan leather shoes, the type worn by monarchs in much of the North.

“That summit changed my life! I was a beggar not by choice - I was challenged but had life! What could I do?”

“I do not beg for alms any more now. I am occupied all day. This friend of mine was my companion when we begged, he has deformed legs. Now he is my partner here.”

Mohammed Yusuf has a modest home and a tall beautiful mother of his two chubby normal children. He is proud of the change as he is now bread winner, managing to look after his family and dependents. He is one of hundreds of thousands of the destitute and vulnerable poor that the Talakawa Summit rescued and given an opportunity to play a role in preparing Jigawa State for this grand opening of doors for economic investment. So successful has empowerment of common folk through a deliberate system of imparting skills and setting beneficiaries off with a starter pack that Jigawa State no longer exports menial labour popularly known as ‘yan ci rani’ across Nigeria. Evident in Jigawa is that there is everywhere, a capable indigene for menial skills like woodwork, carpentry, furniture making, soap-making, vulcanizing, baking, knitting; name it. The impact has cut across male and female, and hundreds of testimonies reveal the triumph of the human spirit when propped up by a appropriate motivation.

Given the linkage that this development has with a well developed infrastructure - a network of good roads (over two thousand kilometres) that “ensure that a farmer is 40 kilometres away from a major market” has given Jigawa State an open environment for commerce making life so unbelievably affordable! An example is the little community of Fagam in Gwaram Local Government, often the highest zakat (tithe) contributor in food items and grain, but a near dead community until a modern by-pass of less than 50 kilometres on Kano-Maiduguri highway provided a link to major markets, overnight giving life unimaginable impact!

Not for the local peasant farmer, the lies Governments tell about tractors, farmers each through a Government Loan Scheme, afford a set of work bulls, a plough and a wagon. Off season, the innovation earns for farmers delivering building materials, cement, blocks, sand, and water. In season the bulls till the soil, weed the crop, and bring home the harvest including the cornstalk and grass for all season feeding of the bull. Jigawa State feeds itself owed to boosted agriculture using a simple solution to otherwise a complicated problem.

A Shari’a and common law based justice system enables ordinary citizens obtain easy settlement of matters giving Jigawa State its reputation of peace and safety even as it is surrounded by volatile “Boko Haram” States. The intricate problem of incessant clashes between grazers and farmers was eliminated by the simple solution of prohibition of cultivation of 30 meters on each shoulder of a Federal Highway, and 20 meters of State highways and reserved as cattle routes.

Simple but profoundly effective in saving the state unnecessary loss of lives these past 5 years.

It is against this background that the greatly innovative Jigawa Economic and Investment Summit needs to be situated.

Again only this paper Daily Trust captured the heart of the matter away from the political cacophony.

The host Sule Lamido had a success story to tell of infrastructure development and the world could not miss that it was empirically evident. The British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Dr Andrew Pocock who launched the Jigawa State Investment Handbook jointly produced by the DFID for long a partner in Jigawa’s development was all the testimony British investors needed to confirm their interests in the next development period of 10 years. British black parliamentarian and occasion chairman Rt. Hon. the Lord Paul  Boateng assured accomplished diaspora Africans with his dignified presence alone.

Nigerian business mogul Aliko Dangote who chaired the first plenary session on investment offered to build a 150,000 tons sugar plant in Kaugama local government area of the state which would provide 15,000 direct employments in the state adding that the multiplier effect could lift several thousands from poverty. Already Jigawa in the last 5 years has empowered shoemakers with skills and equipment to the extent that there is hardly any need to import footwear. The Chinese at the summit promised making inroads with a giant footwear factory in Ringim.