Empty vessels they say makes the loudest cacophony while still waters run deep and this aptly sums up the different political styles and dimensions taken by Sen. Danjuma Goje the state APC leader in his desperate and envious move to miraculously oust governor Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo come April 11, Talban Gombe the eminent and highly respected executive governor of Gombe State who has within a relatively short time in office restored Gombe State to its previous enviable status as the undisputed economic hub of the North-Eastern region. Indeed, Goje ever since leaving office in 2011, apparently behaves as if he should remain the sole occupant of that seat of power and if any other person is to occupy it, the latter occupant must owe total loyalty or fealty to him and must not dare carry out any government action or activity without first obtaining the unconditional imprimatur of Danjuma Goje, clearly forgetting that he was a tenant and we the citizen remain the landlords of the government house.
However, close watchers of Gombe State’s political terrain actually believe that the former helmsman of the Jewel of the Savannah is actually sitting on his last legs as a politician and is about to be shown the way out, firmly decisively and irrevocably because his defection to APC and tricky hijacking of its state leadership position has marked his first step towards unexpected political retirement.
For one, Senator Goje’s antics and shenanigans both on the floor of the senate and at various political functions both within and outside Gombe State have been rash, immature, self-serving, ill-motivated and desperately naïve and unpopular to say the least, and has lowered his estimation irredeemably in the eyes of right thinking Gombians. Whenever he ventures into Gombe State, his acolytes and paid contractors who were privy to the alleged unparalleled looting of the Gombe treasury under his watch would swing into action, hiring crowds of deceived and undiscerning Gombe youths, women and children to turn up at the various routes, Goje traverses, in order to convey a false and misleading appearance of popularity and widespread acceptance by the people to his party APC and his former victim of the political intolerance Gen. Muhammad Buhari.
Various sums of money are dispensed to the unwary youths, whom he prefers to dish pittances to rather than providing them with solid and enduring means of livelihood. It seems that his brand of democracy dividends involves handing out pittances to the down and out rather than empowering them financially, educational or by skills acquisition as the case may be in the present administration of governor Dankwambo. It is indeed not surprising that a desperate and relevance seeking Goje will go to any length to shore up his meager popularity base given the fact that his “defeat” of the then incumbent governor, Alh. Abubakar Hashidu in 2003 was mired in controversy; some observers have fingered former Vice President Alh. Atiku Abubakar over bearing interference in the elections as the singular factor that ensured the ‘victory’ of a beleaguered Goje then a relative green horn in the state and local politics.
Having learnt the ropes of the political arena, albeit in a negative and self-serving, egregious manner, Goje has spuriously embarked on a bull in a China shop charade, upsetting the apple cart and dangerously portraying himself as an iconoclast who believes that the world begins and ends with him. While Goje hardly engages in parliamentary debate in the Senate to provide us we the people of his constituency and the country as a whole, with the much expected dividend of democracy, the political fanatic in him was to find its voice during the Senate hearings involving the Securities and Exchange Commission’s newly appointed DG, Munir Gwarzo. Apparently out to score cheap political points and take a cowardly aim at the Gombe State government, an impassioned Goje continued to unnecessarily and rudely assail, harass and hector the hapless DG over the 20 billion naira infrastructure bond approved for the Gombe State government even though, the popularity and necessity of the bond is unquestioned and unassailable in critical economic, financial and security bond circles and coupled with the huge debt incurred from his locust ravaging regime and equally the people of Gombe State including his constituents has seen and felt the judicious impact of the said bond. Goje and who is acting as his behest, has definitely exposed their rivalry and deep ignorance and misguided confusion over the process, conduct and operation of security bond issues to the thorough embarrassment, befuddlement and even sarcastic amusement general public.
All evils plan against Dankwambo will amount to nothing and be ultimately fruitless as the Talban Gombe stands shoulders above Senator Goje and his minions alike of former Deputy Speaker, Bayero Nafada and APC governorship candidate, Muhammed Inuwa Yahaya, whom it must be stated where all roundly defeated by the able governor in the PDP governorship primaries in 2011 and if Dankwambo could thoroughly defeat minions when he was not an active politician, what would happen now when he, the Talban Gombe, has been tested and trusted and has performed superlatively in the socio-economic arena by delivering precious democracy dividends to his people and the landlords of the government house? It is common knowledge that no political leader, or public office holder has transformed Gombe state as positively as Dankwambo and despite the desperate antics of the Goje led opposition, the Talban Gombe, riding the PDP banner will triumph over his adversaries, overwhelmingly and resoundingly come April 11, 2015. No more, no less.
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Sanusi Bala Sani Akko wrote in from Gombe State.
