INSIDEPOLITICS Why leadership tussle in Kano Assembly persists
The impeachment of the erstwhile Speaker, Kano State House of Assembly, Alhaji Yusuf Abdullahi Ata on Monday, July 30, is the second time there’s a change of leadership in the house since the inauguration of the 8th Assembly in 2015. Both impeachments were carried out within one year.
The lingering battle of supremacy in the House, Daily Trust on Sunday observed, is between Alhaji Kabiru Alhassan Rurum, member representing Rano constituency and Alhaji Yusuf Abdullahi Ata from Fagge constituency. When the 8th Assembly was inaugurated in 2015, the former was speaker and the latter a member.
Trouble started in the House sometime in June 2017 when some lawmakers accused Rurum of collecting the sum of N100million from Alhaji Aliko Dangote to save the Emir of Kano, Malam Muhammad Sanusi ll from being dethroned. Sanusi was being investigated by the House over an alleged abuse of office.
Following the bribery allegation against him, Rurum voluntarily resigned from his position on July 3, 2017 to allow the House conduct investigation into the matter. Consequently, the house elected Ata as new speaker and set up an investigative committee to probe the former speaker.
In view of this development, the House was divided into two camps, with Rurum and Ata as leaders of the groups respectively. After Ata took over the mantle of leadership, Rurum and his loyalists were completely sidelined as they were removed from juicy committees and replaced with Ata’s loyalists.
One of the affected lawmakers, who pleaded for anonymity, told Daily Trust on Sunday that he was removed from his committee in September 2017, and since then, he has not been appointed a member of any committee. He said, “We were persecuted because of our loyalty to Rurum. Most of us were removed from juicy committees; not only that, Ata also refused to attach us to any committee since he assumed office. So, we are only attending sittings without belonging to any committee.”
He further alleged that Rurum’s loyalists were also denied several opportunities in the House since the leadership moved to the Ata-led camp. The lawmaker alleged that they were denied opportunities of foreign trips.
“When such opportunities come to the House we are blocked from being shortlisted among the beneficiaries. In fact, our air tickets were cornered, and when we inquired, neither Speaker Ata nor any of the principal officers could explain the whereabouts of our air tickets. In a nutshell, we have been treated like slaves in this House by the Speaker Ata-led faction,” he alleged.
Eight months after Rurum’s voluntary resignation, the committee set up by the House to investigate him failed to present its report. Based on these developments, the Rurum-led faction had, sometime in May this year, made a frantic attempt to remove Ata from office. But with the quick intervention of Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje and the executive members of the Kano APC, the matter was resolved.
To cement the relationship between the two warring camps, a gentlemanly agreement was reached at a meeting attended by Governor Ganduje and some executive members of the APC. It was agreed at the meeting that three principal officers of the House, who were all from Ata’s camp, should be removed and replaced with others from Rurum’s camp.
Those removed include the Chief Whip, Alhaji Labaran Abdu Madari, Deputy Majority Leader, Alhaji Muhammad Bello ButuButu and Deputy Speaker, Alhaji Hamisu Ibrahim Chidari. They were replaced with Alhaji Baffa Babba Danagundi, Alhaji Kabiru Hassan Dashi and Alhaji Kabiru Alhassan Rurum respectively.
Since then, normalcy returned to the House until Monday, July 30, 2018 when 27 out of 40 members of the House converged on the chamber as early as 9:45am and impeached former Speaker Ata on the allegations of lateness, incompetence, interference into the activities of the executive, poor organisation and the inability to carry all members along.
A source among Rurum’s loyalists told Daily Trust on Sunday that despite being compensated with juicy appointments after their first attempt to remove Ata, they had, for the past two months, been planning on how to remove him from office.
He said they kept their plan to their chest and introduced some codes and sign languages for easy communication. He added that having done that, they also embarked on consultations, especially with lawmakers that parted ways with Ata after he became speaker, with a view to wooing them into their camp.
“I am happy to tell you that this approach has yielded positive results. When we realised that Governor Ganduje and the APC leadership in Kano would not allow us to accomplish our mission, we changed our approach to the issue. First, we ensure that we keep our move secret throughout the two months struggle. Secondly, we ensure that we bring some lawmakers from Ata’s camp into our own.
“I can vividly remember that during our first attempt to remove Ata, we were 24, but in the second attempt we were 27. And while the impeachment process was taking place in the chamber, six other lawmakers also joined our group. The issue was that we all understand that Ata was desperate to become the next deputy governor of the state in the event that Professor Hafiz Abubakar, the current deputy governor is removed.
“This is why Ata and his loyalists concentrated so much on the issue of the removal of deputy governor, holding several meetings in that regard. We used this opportunity to get the confidence of Ata’s loyalists by showing our willingness to support his ambition to become the next deputy governor. With this, Ata and his loyalists were reluctant with us, thinking that we were 100 per cent with them.
But deep inside us, we had a different motive, which is removing Ata from office.
“During one of our meetings, it was resolved that we should meet at the chamber on Monday, July 30, 2018 by 12pm to actualise the removal of the deputy governor, Professor Abubakar. However, when the meeting was over, we, the loyalists of Rurum called our people for another round of meeting, where we resolved to impeach Ata on that fateful Monday. We agreed to come to the House by 9:45 instead of 12pm as scheduled during our meeting with Ata’s loyalists.
“By 9:45am we were all seated inside the chamber, and by 10am we started the impeachment processes. Alhaji Labaran Abdu Madari from Warawa constituency raised a motion of urgent public importance on the floor of the House, requesting for the immediate impeachment of Speaker Ata over allegations of incompetence, lateness, poor organisation and inability to carry all members along. The motion was seconded by the deputy majority leader of the House, Alhaji Abdullahi
Muhammad Chiromawa, member representing Kura/ Garun-Malam constituency.
“We removed Ata and subsequently elected Rurum as new speaker. Shortly after he was sworn in, a motion was moved for the dissolution of the principal officers and new principal officers were elected. The House continued with its normal sitting,” he revealed.
Prior to the removal of Speaker Ata, it was rumoured that 22 lawmakers of the
Kano State House of Assembly had defected to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) alongside Senator Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso. But later, it became clear that no member of the House defected to the PDP from the ruling APC.
Daily Trust on Sunday observed that the lingering leadership crisis that led to the removal of two speakers was purely based on personal political objectives of the two warring groups. Contrary to speculations, the internal crisis in Kano Assembly has nothing to do with Governor Ganduje or Senator Kwankwaso as was widely perceived by some politicians.
Consequently, the crisis has negatively impacted on the activities of the
House, especially in areas of efficiency in handling matters, attendance of sittings and commitment to responsibilities assigned to lawmakers, among other issues.
It was observed that with the change of leadership in the House, lawmakers now commence sittings by 9am as against the usual 12pm. Also, efficiency in handling matters in the chamber has been improved after the return of Speaker Rurum.
Further observation showed that commitment to assigned responsibilities by the lawmakers has been restored by the current leadership of the House.
“Unlike before, any member assigned with a responsibility is willing to handle it with efficiency because he knows that the House will not condone any form of laxity anymore. Members of the House are now committed to the responsibilities assigned to them,” a lawmaker who craved for anonymity said.