Bauchi 2019: Abdul Ningi’s political mirage, by Shafi’u Auwalu

Today’s politics is becoming more interesting because as the electorate becomes more informed, it adds more beauty as they equally stand against all the political beguilements of the past and a politician that knows only propaganda and deceit may end up edging himself out of the scene.
The fact is that, people can easily differentiate between selfish political craftiness and a genuine cause.
The recent daydreaming comments by Abdul Ningi is one of such laughable chicanery that has now become outdated in Bauchi state politics.
Ningi and the PDP propaganda machines are at it again dishing out all forms of lies, deceit, falsehood and spurious tales of moonlight that even an infant can decipher not to talk of adults or upstanding pillars of society like Bauchi people.
The latest interview that was granted by Senator Ningi did not disappoint those used to the garrulous penchant of the PDP’s yesterday men as he cast all manner of political narcosis, half-truths, and parodies meant to shore up the fast dwindling morale of Ningi’s and his PDP’s rapidly shrinking support base in Bauchi state.
In the face of clear evidence to the contrary, Abdul Ningi insinuated that the recent Bauchi South Senatorial Byeelection was manipulated by the APC.
He did not substantiate the allegation preferring to leave the readers in suspense by his oblique statement that ‘we knew what happened in the senatorial election, we would handle that.’ Ningi should tell the whole world and most importantly the people of Bauchi state what actually happened in the Bauchi South bye-election.
Was it his party, the PDP, that won the elections and by what margin and by what number of votes cast? There is no need for him to engage in nebulous and mysterious soliloquizing on such a serious matter if he actually believes that his party, the PDP, was denied of its victory at the polls.
Or has he become tongue tied due to the glaring reality that the PDP was thoroughly and decisively trounced by the vastly popular APC, leaving him speechless and clueless as to what to say or fabricate? Indeed, Abdul Ningi has been known to be vocal and sharp tongued when deliberating on critical issues of the day.
So even his supporters and the general public will really be at their wits end as to his less than articulate rendering of the specifics of the APC’s alleged manipulation of the bye-election results.
It seems that the former Senate Majority Leader is tongue tied like many in the PDP’s hierarchy who are yet to come to terms with the immutable and unshakable support base of the APC in Bauchi state and the Northeast as well as other parts of the country.
The results of the Presidential elections in Bauchi state are there for all to see.
President Muhammadu Buhari clinched a record shattering over 900,000 votes while the PDP’s President Jonathan went home with a paltry 90,000.
The same feat was repeated in the gubernatorial election with the APC sweeping the polls by a landslide.
Of course, contrary to what the downcast Ningi posited that the people are regretting their vote for the APC, it was the glaring non-performance and downright incompetence of the Goodluck Jonathan and Mallam Isa Yuguda administrations at the federal level and Bauchi state, respectively, that made the people run to the APC to rescue them before it becomes too late.
In fact, how can Senator Ningi even have the effrontery to state that the record is there for everyone to see? Is it the Mallam Isa Yuguda record of ineptitude, alleged contract inflation, ghost contracts and alleged massive looting of the treasury that is there to see? But without doubt, the Bauchi state government under Mallam Isa Yuguda has been chronicled as the worst in the history of the state and even the nation as the state’s chief executive was busy gallivanting around the globe either in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Hong Kong, or London holidaying and tending to his plethora of business interests while the state was burning and tensionsoaked.
Yuguda and his PDP cronies and acolytes allegedly bled the state treasury dry thus his glaring unpopularity and lack of acceptance by most segments of Bauchi society.
No wonder he was defeated in the byelection, repeating the 2015 scenario where he contested the Senatorial elections and could only carry 3 out of 8 local governments.
Contrary to the assertions of Abdul Ningi, the Bauchi people are not fools and they know what is good for them and who their true friends are, in the person and office of the incumbent governor, Barrister M. A. Abubakar, who has been delivering key dividends of democracy to them in the critical areas of health, education, agriculture, water, roads, rural infrastructure, power, manpower development and women and youth empowerment.
Unlike the venal and lightfingered cabal that held sway during the infamous days of Isa Yuguda, the M. A. Abubakar administration is a true government of the people by the people and for the people.
The government has touched virtually all nooks and crannies of Bauchi state without regard to ethnic, religious, linguistic, sectional or partisan affiliations unlike the PDP’s sustained efforts to divide the state along religious and ethnic lines.
If Ningi is intending to contest the 2019 gubernatorial polls, he is free to do so as it is his constitutional right, but there is no need for him to engage in wild speculation or shadow chasing while abandoning the substance.
He and the entire PDP should first tender an unreserved and unconditional apology to the people of Bauchi state and indeed all Nigerians for the 16 years of the locust that they rendered on the nation and its resources.
Auwalu writes from Bauchi