From Bello Mukhtar, Bauchi
The Bauchi State Governor, Barrister M.A. Abubakar is running scared in the city of Abuja from one sitting room to the other in search of who will make sure of his victory at the Supreme Court. Having made numerous political miscalculations, Mr. Abubakar is literally in fear of an impending downward dive. We gathered that the Bauchi State governor allegedly showed interest in the Vice Presidential seat should the president resign or depart this planet. His meetings with the Ahmad Muazu faction of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) and the promise he made to them of slots in his cabinet which has already started with his appointment of Alhaji Muhammad Nadada Umar as the Secretary to the State Government who was also SSG for the Ahmadu Muazu administration from 1999 to 2007.
Loading ...Bauchi State is currently the only state in Nigeria without a working executive council, it has no elected local government council and has the leanest political appointments in the country of less than fifteen persons in his entire government which supposedly should serve about nine million people.
The case of the Bauchi State governorship Primaries was postponed in April of this year by Justice Odilli at the Supreme Court due to a petition as mentioned by the judge. She narrated that she was accused of deliberately taking sides with the Governor and concluded that they were uncomfortable with her as the Judge. She also said, the petitioner alleged that she was at Bauchi on holidays and was a guest of the governor while she was there.
Curiously, the current Bauchi State Governor, Abubakar was INEC’s Resident Electoral Commissioner for Rivers State during the 2003 General Elections and the then governor of Rivers State was Dr. Peter Odilli, the husband of this Judge in question.
As it were, it was learnt that the Bauchi State governor M. A. Abubakar bragged about his savvy and acumen regarding matters of law. An anonymous source informed us that the governor openly boasted that he was the one that engineered the petition against Justice Odilli so that the case would be pushed to a farther date. The governor did get what he wanted as Justice Odilli postponed the case to January of 2018. What the governor didn’t bargain for is the fact that the plaintiff will petition the postponement.
The petition did receive favourable hearing and the case was brought back to the 19th of September 2017. In fear of the foreseen danger headed his way, the governor ran to Abuja and is running from pillar to post trying to make sure he is not removed from office as doing so will expose his dirty deals especially his squander-mania of the Bailout Funds and Paris Club Refunds, not to talk about statutory monthly grants amounting to billions of Naira without any tangible achievement to show for it. Unfortunately, as it is typical of the governor, he is already running his mouth cursing from the Speaker of the Federal House of Representatives, Right Honourable Yakubu Dogara, other Senators and political heavyweights of his state, saying they cannot match him Naira for Naira. He is said to have promised to spend even if it will be the last Kobo of his state’s resources in order to save himself from embarrassment and possibly jail term.
It is believed that the powers that be around the Supreme Court are wary of this noisy governor who rents television crews to broadcast his propaganda only to tell people he bribed them to gather the way they did. It is believed that his antecedents are known around the Supreme Court and even within his Party the APC, he is not respected as people don’t feel sorry for him due to the way he embarrassed President Buhari during the 2003 Presidential elections by declaring results before the end of voting and granting 100% victory to the then ruling party. Another reason why the APC national body disdains him is his romance with the opposition party which renders the party’s influence in Bauchi state ( a very important state to the party), almost non existent. This is not to mention the rumours of his Vice Presidential ambition.
Clearly, the way things are at the moment, Barrister M. A. Abubakar may only have his money to hold on to as he runs around trying to see who will buy his bluff, take a massive risk of pitching his tent with this extremely arrogant individual whose craftiness knows no bounds. Political observers are of the opinion that he is indeed on his own as even his learned colleagues are not willing to be caught even in death with him in bed.
