Taraba State Governor, Agbu Kefas, speaks in this interview on measures so far taken by his administration to reposition the state for sustainable development and other issues. What are your plans to cushion the effects of the hardship brought about by the fuel subsidy removal on Taraba people? Part of the major crisis of the subsidy removal is the escalation in the prices of every other thing.
You can agree with me that in Nigeria, almost everything else is linked to the prices of fuel. So, the first thing we did is to revolutionarily declare free education. Remember this was our campaign promise because we saw this coming and we had to keep to it. So basically, we have to take the worry of the parents about school fees off, so that they could focus on feeding and other family challenges.
We figured out that the fact that parents don’t have to bother about school fees, new uniforms, books and all of that is a major relief from the burden of the subsidy removal and the accompanying hardships that come with it. Beyond this, we are also reaching out to the farmers to make sure that they are able to transport their food products to the markets with relative ease. In fact, our target is to provide farm inputs such as fertilisers, herbicides, insecticides, pesticides, improved seedlings, tractors and other inputs they may need to ensure bumper harvest as well as cost effectiveness of moving their products to the markets.
This will certainly impact the prices of food stuff. And we have embarked on massive employment. In fact, about 10,000 young person’s have been given jobs already as task force to tackle the issue of environmental sanctity just to ensure that our streets are relatively clean.
Over the years, there have been agitations that Jalingo has the most unkept streets. Now that is in the past. We also have arrangements on ground to speedily implement the new minimum wage as soon as the Federal Government and the organised labour are able to come to an agreed figure.
These are just some of the basic measures we are putting in place to cushion the impact of the fuel subsidy removal. But you must note that, subsidy removal or not, our administration has the overall objective of making life better for the people of Taraba State. So, we already fashioned out a blueprint that will ensure that there are deliberate policies that will offer the people opportunities to grow and make the best of their environments.
That is what we already had in mind and we will implement it to the letter. How do you intend to fund this free education you talked about? Well, first of all, I believe in cutting down the cost of governance. That means I will be saving quite a fortune from that. Besides that, we have been empowered by the state House of Assembly to obtain a loan that will enable us achieve most of our targets. And let me even say this for the purpose of emphasis that irrespective of the level of government, there is never a shortage of funds to carry out developmental projects.
What is usually the problem is lack of political will and transparency as well as accountability. It is never about how much you have but how transparent and decently you deploy the resources for the common good of the people that counts ultimately. We are here purposefully to serve the people, so the political will is even the guiding principle behind our coming on board. Again, without being too modest, looting to amass wealth is not part of my agenda. As a person, I am already well contented. I am blessed beyond measure already, so I have no need for the state’s resources.
We have a near zero greed level and that makes it easy to free some funds to take care of some of these projects. The amount parents spend on school fees is not so exorbitant that the government cannot afford to take it off. So, one thing we have done is to engage the teachers and school managements to get them to buy into the idea.
In fact, I had an extensive meeting with teachers across the state and I can assure you that after explaining my intentions to them, they bought into this idea overwhelmingly. So, it is no longer a matter of taking a project to them that they are not aware of. They are part of the planning and implementation process so they have come to accept it as their project. And I can assure you that it’s going to be a smooth sail.
And let me just clear it here that it’s not just about the school fees. For the state-owned university, we have slashed the school fees by 50 per cent. For primary and secondary education, it is absolutely free. But then, we are also providing free uniforms, books and all of that. So, it is a very comprehensive package or so to say.
What are your plans for uncompleted projects by the previous administration? You understand that in a democratic setting, governance is a continuous process. One administration naturally slides into the other. So, I can assure you that this government is already looking at all the projects that were ongoing during the last administration to ensure that those that need to be completed are done so and those that need to be fine-tuned are also done so.
Yes, there are a lot of projects that were supposedly completed and commissioned but we know better. The most important thing is that we are looking into all of these to see how we can complete them for the good of the people, even as we initiate new projects in line with our blueprint. How will you describe the situation of things in the state when you came on board? First of all, you need to understand that we came on board when there is a global economic downturn. It is a time of serious changes in the economic fortunes of a lot of people and we are not unaware of these. We are also confronted with the issue of insecurity as a national reality. So, in the midst of all these, we are focused on ensuring that we work with our development partners around the world to see how we can move the stage forward.
I understand that the people are more interested in what we have on ground for them that what the situation was when we took over. So, we are more focused on building a state of their dream rather than lamenting over the mistakes or undoing of past administrations in the state. We have seen lots of windows of opportunity and we intend to explore them maximally rather than trading blames. We are literally restarting Taraba as a state. That is why we have new ministries such as that of waste management that will turn waste into renewable energy.
We also have the ministry of digital economy and lots more. So, we are more focused on our plans for the state than the history of the state and its attendant consequences. What are the major challenges you have encountered so far? Well, the most important thing to note is that the people are willing to support this government to move the state forward. That is one huge boost to us. Of course, we are faced with the challenge of shortage of funds which is a general issue. The challenges we have met are enormous but we see them as windows of opportunities instead.
Things are really tough but we believe every issue is surmountable. Look at insecurity for instance. This has plagued the people for quite a while now. We came on board with a near full proof blueprint to tackle the issue and that will show the people that there are always better ways of looking and tackling issues. So basically, we are seeing the Taraba problems as project opportunities that will give the peo- ple a sense of good governance and a feeling of something new and really good. Of course, we understand that we must confront issues of disunity. We have a state that is pulverised and polarised terribly. That is an issue. But then the body language of my administration alone has shown everybody that those dividing lines must be deleted. And so gradually, people are going to focus more on the issues rather than religion and ethnicity. We cannot be wasting time on such mundane issues at this time of our statehood. For the first time in the history of the state, everyone is on the same page that we must put Taraba first. As a government, I can assure you that whatever the problems are, we will tackle them squarely because we have the political will and initiatives to navigate our way around. What are some of the key areas you intend to focus attention on to boost Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) of the state? Agriculture naturally takes the lead. It is providing the platform for so many opportunities in both crop and animal husbandry. Taraba has the longest stretch of the river Benue as you know. That means we can explore commercial fishing for instance, to boost our IGR. Some countries depend basically on fishing for sustenance. In fact, the entire Dubai used to be a fishing port as you know. Again, having the longest stretch of river Benue also means we have enormous potentials in irrigation systems of farming in and out of season.
That means we can conveniently supply all the rice that Nigeria needs and more. We can provide a steady supply of tomatoes and other vegetables. Kenya as a country survives largely on tour- ism and tea production. Now these are two things that we have in excess on the Mambila plateau. In fact, our tea is seen as the best in the world. There was a time that they even held a world tea conference there. What most people don’t also realise is that we have cocoa in commercial quantities here in Taraba.
The land is such that we produce literally everything. We have avocados, apple, plantain, Irish potatoes, all kinds of roots and tubers. There is no grain or seed that is not grown in Taraba. It might also please you to note that we have the highest concentration of cattle in the country. So, we would explore the limitless opportunities in agriculture for the general growth of the state. Another area we would focus attention is solid minerals. We are expecting massive revenue from exploitation of solid minerals. You are aware that Taraba has literally all the solid minerals you can think of. We have uranium, gold, columbite and a whole lot. The first thing we did was to place a ban on illegal mining across the state. The essence is to get licensed miners to do their work in a controlled way so that the government can also derive the needed benefits.
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