Nasarawa governor, Abdullahi Sule on Saturday applauded policies and initiatives of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for driving investments in infrastructure and businesses in his state and across Nigeria. Sule, who spoke at the beginning of the Renewed Hope Ambassadors enabled media tour of federal and state projects in Nasarawa said President Tinubu deserves credits for ongoing investments in infrastructure across states in Nigeria as they are direct result of his removal of subsidy and other policies that have led to increase in funds going from the federal purse to the subnational governments. Excerpts

By Ayorinde Oluokun

Nasarawa’s Monthly FAAC Allocation Boosted To Over N14 billion Under Tinubu

I have always asked for this kind of thing, for this verification. But let me tell you, you are doing just more than verification. You are also doing an assessment. I thank you for engaging in this because I’ve always challenged the media every time they ask questions – That, ‘okay, you have said you have withdrawn the subsidy. Okay, what are we seeing?” Okay. So, I said, “Why don’t you go to these various places?” That’s why I’m so happy to see the faces that are going with you because it will give them the opportunity to do that. For us in Nasarawa State, we are very transparent. I came from the private sector, so every contract I give, I give the amount that we are spending on that contract. And then, people can now make the difference with the kind of money we are receiving. n my first four years, everybody knows, Nigeria was sharing anywhere between maybe 590 billion to about 620 billion monthly. The total FAAC allocation for Nasarawa State was between maybe 3.8 to somewhere about 4.5 billion for the state. For the local government, anywhere between 1.9 to anywhere to 2.5 billion every month. With the removal of subsidy, Nasarawa State is receiving an average of 14 to 16 billion every month. That’s why when I said he took the bullet on our behalf. I think you have to be able to find a way to commend your leaders when they do right. Now, based on what we are receiving, you may go to a certain state that things do not relate with the kind of resources they are receiving. The media going with you will criticize you. I want you to remember that. And that is right also, because it wakes people up. There is nothing wrong with that. It will wake people up to say that “Ah, it doesn’t look like whatever I’m doing is meeting with the resources I’m receiving.” So, the governors should be concerned about this trip that you are making. We should be concerned because it is time now to be accountable.

Give credits for Nasarawa’s investments In Infrastructure To Tinubu

All the projects we are doing in Nasarawa State today, at no borrowing from the bank, is as a result of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s support. It’s very difficult for or you to say, I’m going to see federal government projects, and I’m going to state government projects. So which one is state government? Which one is federal government? All the projects we are doing in Nasarawa State today, at no borrowing from the bank, is as a result of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s support. So, you must give him the credit for that. Without the reforms, we would not have had the resources to do what we are doing. So, I can’t take credit for those projects. I’m happy you are going to see some of them that everybody is talking about. You are going to our first-class secretariat. You go and see the office of the SSG is better than my own office. And there is nothing wrong with that, because at the time they built my own office, Tinubu was not there. Yeah, we didn’t have the resources that we have today. So, there is nothing wrong with me doing it better today because we are receiving the resources better today. And anybody coming in as the governor, if he like, he can build a new government house where he can now build based on what is happening today. But for now, I use the resources to do all that. We have the combined overhead and underground flyover. Our president came last year to commission it. We built it for 6.7 billion. Okay? Dualization of the Akwanga township. There are two of them. The real dualization itself, because Akwanga is a new town altogether. That town dualisation is actually done for 7.1 billion. Then we have an underpass also inside the same Akwanga. We built it for 6.6 billion. And then the Keffi Flyover, that’s where a lot of accidents have taken place. So many people died in that. So today, we are doing it 11.4 billion. And then, we constructed the twin flyover in Karu. That’s the one that a lot of you are happy with because maybe for those who live in Karu, you will see it. It is bringing economic advancement in the area. Just two days ago, we actually received 500 million naira from one of the real estates as our profit sharing for that same site where we invested only about 170 million. But you see, those are the businesses we do because I approach all these things purely like the way business is going to be approached. Now, Nasarawa State, no way in the past years could think of spending this amount of money. And you will not understand it until I dramatize it for you. Let me dramatize it for you – In the year 2019, I came in as a governor and we were looking for five billion naira bond in order to build a market because the total allocation coming to the state was less than 60 billion. Our budget was like 90 billion. We would do performance of about 66% with about 60 billion. That’s it. 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022. Those are the kinds of monies we are receiving. So, I was looking for five billion. And they said, “Well, if it is the time that you are in Dangote, we will give you. But this five billion for Nasarawa, we have to check it properly, sir.” And so, I had meetings upon meetings. I had nothing less than 10 meetings for this five billion naira. And we had to go and also do ISPO because they have to ensure that they will deduct it directly from our money to build a market. Okay, so I couldn’t get that. Now, what I just counted projects that are worth up to 90 billion. We did it without borrowing one naira from anybody. And most of them have already been paid off.

‘We’re Focusing On Projects That Touch Lives’

We are doing so much in education, and education is key to me. Being an engineer, vocational and technical education, I strongly believe no matter your degree, PhD, MSF, BSc, whatever it is, you also need a skill. So, one of the approaches that we have in Nasarawa State is ensuring that we build skill acquisition centers. The skill acquisition center we have is teaching about 12 different trades, vocations – from electrical installation to metal machining, to carpentry and joinery, to cabinet making to welding and fabrication, to radio mechanics, to agricultural mechanization, all of them, we have them down there. And people actually who have degrees in other areas are going there to learn trade. And when they come out, I tell them, throughout my work in the US in the oil and gas sector, people are not interested in civil service work. When they have a trade, they are more interested in working for themselves. And that is the idea about it. So that is the center we brought, and from all over the country, people are coming there to acquire education for that trade. That is one thing we have done. When I was the managing director of African Petroleum, I learned something – people who have spent all their years working inside the company, and that’s the only thing they knew how to do – When I actually let them go and then give them their severance packages, a lot of them didn’t know what to do with the money because they had no skill to do anything else. So, what I do here is that I have post-retirement skill acquisition also at the center. It’s all part of the program that we are doing. So, it’s not just for the youth, it’s also for the old people like you and I, so that we can go and learn skill and be able to take it off from there. So that’s one good thing I think that we are doing. In the healthcare, Nasarawa, thank again to this administration – is of the few states in the federation that in each one of the three senatorial zones, we now also have a tertiary medical facility. We have the Teaching Hospital here in Lafia. We have the FMC in Keffi. But we also now have the Specialist Hospital, which is being built by us in Akwanga – the state government, through the resources that we are receiving. You need to do certain things that are touching the lives of the people. I come as the group managing director of Dangote Refinery. In the whole of businesses of Aliko Dangote, the one that was given the least amount of revenue is actually that of agriculture. But the one that is impacting the life of the people the most is also agriculture. So, for that reason, in Nasarawa State, we have 10,000 hectares of land where we are doing rice. Our own rice is not just for the media. It’s real rice that we are actually doing. Those are areas that we’re making that great impact.

Tinubu policy turns Nasarawa into hub of lithium processing

The lithium processing plant – it’s a private sector, so somebody may criticize it, just like they criticized our refinery to say that “Ah, it’s Dangote who solved the problem of refinery.” Yes. However, what gave him the ground and everything to solve that problem is the policy of the federal government that we have. Today, the two lithium processing plant – it is because of the policies – ensuring that anybody who is coming to mine in Nasarawa State must also process in Nasarawa State. When we talked about it with President Bola Tinubu, he supported it. He took it abroad and they liked it. From the beginning, I criticized the appointment of Dele Alake as a minister of solid resources because I think he’s a media man. He doesn’t understand anything about this thing. But the man came in, he now is a better mining engineer than me. And he talks mining as if he’s an engineer, and he’s a media guy for God’s sake. And these are the things that happen. But why did he do that? It’s because he copied from his boss, he agreed with the direction of his boss, and he bought into it, he’s serious about it. He gave me all the support I needed, and that’s how we were able to build not only the biggest lithium mining facility in Nigeria, but the biggest in Africa. People love to buy lithium right now. So, you cannot take away the credit from this administration. It’s to understand that what is driving these policies? What are these governors doing with the resources that they are getting? How is it impacting in the lives of the people? Any leader that is doing well and is being encouraged, the leader gets on and do well some more. But when a leader is doing so well and you are criticizing the deed, criticizing all the time, criticize, it actually demoralizes the leader.