Kaduna State House of Assembly has vowed to bring to book all those who contributed in bringing the state to its knees to the extent that it has become an economic pariah that nobody wants to deal with, and has therefore set its eyes of former governor, Nasir El-Rufai.
Yusuf Liman, Speaker, who said this was part of the reason the assembly constituted a committee to investigate how the $350 million World Bank loan obtained by the former governor was spent, explained that other financial spending and abandoned projects initiated by the immediate past government between 2015 to 2023, were also under the radar.
Mugu Yusuf, representing Kauru constituency, who spoke in support of his motion, asking the House to investigate all the loans obtained by the El-Rufai administration, before the inauguration of a 13-man committee for that purpose, had told his colleagues: “There have been uncomplimentary comments and assassinations of character on the leadership of the state, which the assembly cannot sit and watch.
“That is why I came up with this motion that the Speaker constitute a committee to investigate the allegations and negative comments on them. This is the only way the state can rekindle its confidence in its development partners, collaborators, and also those who give us loans and grants; failure to do this will push the indicators of the state to a situation whereby nobody will want to do business with us.”
Yusuf Zailani, former Speaker under whose tenure the loan was obtained, while denying that the ninth assembly approved the facility, said: “I suffered a lot in order not to give approval for the loan to be collected. Even the then deputy Speaker Isaac Auta Zankhai was against me because I disagreed with the loan to be collected. I told the then-governor to look at the number of loans we had on hand, and he didn’t listen to me.”
Henry Marah, representing Jaba constituency, and Samuel Kambai, his counterpart from the Zangon Kataf, while insisting maintaining that no such loans could be obtained without the endorsement of the assembly lamented that the case of Kaduna was different, and urged the committee to summon the eighth and ninth assembly speakers, along with some members of the same assembly, to come and give explanations on how the loans were collected and spent.
The inauguration of the 13-man committee with Aminu Anti, representing Doka Gabasawa as the chairman, Yusuf Mugu Kaura as deputy, Munira Tanimu, Shehu Yunusa and nine others as members, is coming on the heels of an alarm raised by Uba Sani, the current governor, where he told stakeholders of the state at a townhall meeting in March that he inherited a huge debt burden of $587m, N85bn, and 115 contractual liabilities from the immediate El-Rufai, a situation he claimed had eaten deep into the state’s federal allocation, making governance quite difficult.