2019: Why Buhari will win Adamawa very clearly - Bindow
Jibrilla Bindow is contesting for second term as Governor of Adamawa State on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Bindow, who was a member of the 7th Senate, in this interview with selected journalists, explained why President Muhammadu B
Honestly, there are certain local governments I may not personally go to campaign especially in the northern zone where I come from because I have done so much in terms of development in that area. They feel that I am their son and why should I come to campaign when I am going for my second term. Seeing what I have done, they know that if I return again as governor, I will do more for them. So, I will rather go to other areas to campaign. For example, if I go to Shelleng, for 70 years, they had no road. But if you go there today, I have given them an asphalt road. I promise to construct their road and I did fulfill my promise and construct a 47 km road for them with two big bridges and it is there for them to see.
Out of 21 local governments, I have projects in 19 and the projects are there for anyone to see; if it is not roads, then hospitals and schools. There are so many things that we can tell the people. In campaigning for the President, I can say that the money we are using comes from the President. The Mayo Beluwa, Jada, Ganye road where Atiku comes from is being constructed by Buhari and there is no way he will not win election there. Atiku is from that area and Bamanga Tukur is from that area also, and they did not construct the road when they had the opportunity. Except if the people are ungrateful, they will not leave the person who is working for them to go and vote for the man who did nothing for them. If opinion molders who are coming in here have given Adamawa to APC because we have worked for the people. Even those people that don’t like me will try and work for Buhari. This campaign that we have flagged-off, we are going to start our local government campaign. Before then, we will zone the state into three segments and start within the zones. We have already established campaign councils in each of the zones and have already inaugurated them to campaign for the President, the governor and all other candidates of the APC. By Monday, we will start going to the local governments and to continue what the zonal campaign teams have started already. Basically, this is what we are going to do having inaugurated and flagged-off the campaign. You saw that the flag was given to us and l will now go round to give members of the Assembly and other persons their flags. a serious challenge?
Yes, as a former Senator, not only that l was opportuned to be in the Senate, l was also the Vice Chairman, Committee on Defence and l knew how this area used to be in terms of insurgency, struggling and the way our people were suffering. I was almost the de facto chairman because the chairman didn’t like coming to the North East because of Boko Haram. He is from Rivers State and he was not comfortable coming here. Honestly, after President Buhari was sworn in and we started seeing what he was doing in terms of fighting insurgency. The commitment of the President in fighting Boko Haram is what everybody here must commend. Before now, they (Boko Haram insurgents) used to go in thousands to capture villages and towns.
For your information, they even captured my own local government, Mubi - the second largest town in the state. Some people will tell you that Mubi, in terms of population is even more than Yola but Boko Haram almost captured that place for 14 days and at that time, the Chief of Defence Staff, Badeh, who is now late is from there. He was in service and they captured that place and even changed the name of Mubi to Midinatumhanji Islam but immediately the President came in before you could say anything things started getting better and not only that, we in the state collaborated with the Military and with the local hunters in the entire process. The local humters really helped us. This Boko Haram thing, honestly, up till now nobody has told me the real objective of this struggle that they are doing.
For me, it is just a bunch of International criminals that are just trying to terrorise everybody because they would go and burn churches, burn Mosques, kill children, kill women, break banks and do all sorts of crimes. So, what is it about? It has nothing to do with religion. There is no religion that says go and kill women and children. Basically, the President has done very well and even with the IDPS that were left with us in Adamawa. When we came in we had about 25 IDP camps and out of the 25, l will tell you that 95 per cent of the contents of the IDP camps were not from Adamawa State. We say no, this must stop. We don’t want to say we have IDPS and it will stop us from developing Adamawa. So, we tried to send those IDPS back. Those from Adamawa were taken back to their communities and those from other communities, mainly Borno, we tried to talk to the governor to take them back and from there as far as Adamawa is concerned our security, generally is stable and everywhere is calm. We want to campaign based on issues. On fighting the insurgency, President Buhari has done a lot of things in terms of community development in the State. There’s no road today in this state, federal roads, where work is not going on. You can go and verify it. From Yola as you are going to Mubi, you will see contractor working. From Mubi to Maiduguri, people are working physically now. You can see it. From Yola to Gombe, one Chinese company is also working. From Numan to Taraba, they are on site. From Mayo Beluwa to Jada, which is where Atiku hails from, that road has been there for over 20 years, nobody has done the road. That road, Jada - Ganye – Tonga, has produced vice president, Atiku; Bamanga Tukur, the former PDP National Chairman, he is from Jada; PPS to former president Goodluck Jonathan, Hassan Tukur; the former Comptroller General of the Nigeria Custom Service (NCS) is from there.
Many personalities that could have done that road are from there. So, will you go and tell those people not to vote for Buhari. This road is going on. They have seen development and change in their own life. So, by the time we say ‘go and vote for Buhari’, they will do it. I hope you understand what I’m saying. The fact is that we can campaign based on issues. I don’t talk on anything personal. For me, it’s not politics. Once you start personalising things, then you are not a politician. I don’t want to be part of that kind of uncivilised things. We want to campaign based on issues. Even in the state, if not because the President is helping us by bringing the Paris Club refund and all sorts of things, we cannot build all the infrastructure you are seeing. And the people know. So, when we say vote for Buhari, they will vote. You will see Buhari winning Adamawa very clearly at the end of the day.