EMMANUEL SAMUEL, YOLA
A hundred days after the Adamawa State Governor, Rt. Hon Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri, was sworn into office as the state’s chief executive officer, it has become imperative to take stock of the journey his administration embarked upon since May 29 this year.
CIVIL SERVICE SECTOR
The Fintiri-led administration in Adamawa State under the dynamic leadership of the incumbent governor, has achieved so much within a very short time. It has brought “fresh air” into the governance of the state by offsetting a backlog of unpaid salaries and wages inherited from the immediate past government.
On assumption of office, the two months’ salaries being owed civil servants in the state by its predecessor were paid the workers. Furthermore, leave grants that had been unpaid for some years have now been partly settled. Governor Fintiri has maintained that paying workers emoluments should be treated as a right and not a privilege. Now in Adamawa State, salaries are paid on or before the 25th of every month guided by a Memorandum of Understanding with the paying banks.
SECURITY SERVICES
Governor Fintiri has in the past 100 days restored the hope of the ordinary people in the state by delivering on his campaign promises and his administration’s 11-point agenda. In the area of security, the state government has impacted positively by reining in a notorious gang known as “Shila Boys” that had for long been terrorising the residents of the state. Using security agencies in the state, the Fintiri administration has succeeded in flushing out these suspected criminals from their hideouts, including the dread “Mini Sambisa Forest” located on the bank of the Benue River. The administration has also chased away from the state capital, Yola, hundreds of hoodlums and drug addicts, who hitherto had held sway.
EDUCATION SECTOR
The Fintiri administration has also, within the first 100 days in office, also declared free and compulsory Basic Education for all residents of Adamawa State in public schools. The free education package also includes free books and other materials for learning, as well as free enrolment for the WAEC and NECO examinations candidates’ in all public schools in the state. To crown it all, for the first time in many years feeding has been reintroduced in public schools in the state, thereby reducing the burden on parents and enabling those from very poor families to have one balanced meal a day while in school. The feeding factor itself is an incentive for many school age children to go to school.
Another bold step taken by the Fintiri administration is the reversal of illegal tenancy on lands appropriated from schools and tertiary institutions and given out by the previous governments. These lands include those of the Adamawa State Polytechnic campuses, GGSS Yola, Aliyu Musdafa School, Yola, and parts of the Jimeta Ultra-Modern Market, where illegal allocation had been the order of the day. He has revived technical skills acquisition centres that train young men and women with skills that would make them self-sufficient.
HEALTH SECTOR
In the health sector, the new administration has tackled a worrisome aspect of life by declaring free healthcare for the elderly, pregnant women and children under five years. This says a lot about the government that shows concern for these vulnerable category of people in a bid to assess the level of decay in the health sector in the state.
On Agriculture, when Fintiri assumed office, he inherited a bagful of unpleasant farmers/herders’ clashes that created mini theatres of war across the state. On a weekly basis, farmers and herders spread across the state were at loggerheads with hundreds killed and maimed. This security challenge was tackled by the Fintiri administration through the intervention of security personnel, dialogue with local communities and traditional rulers. These methods has drastically reduced the frequency of such clashes in the state.
KIDNAPPING
A result of the farmers/herders’ clashes that the new government inherited is the problem of kidnapping, which became rampant in the last four years before the
Fintiri-led administration came into office. But today, kidnappers no longer find it easy to operate in the state as the government has put to use security agents that are constantly trailing suspected kidnappers, potential kidnappers and their cohorts. The effect is that farmers/herders’ clashes and its twin evil of kidnapping have drastically been reduced.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT FINANCIAL AUTONOMY
While some pessimists believe that no governor could refrain from dipping his hands in the juicy bundle meant for local government, Governor Fintiri is one of the first state chief executive to grant full financial autonomy to local governments in the state. To cap it all, he made it mandatory for the state-owned newspaper to publish the monthly allocations to all the councils in the state, including the payroll of the councils so that the local populace would know the amount accruable to their councils’ government and how much is left after payment of salaries. This has kept local government council chairmen in the state on their toes. It has also promoted transparency and accountability in the finance of the councils.
HOUSING ESTATES
Governor Fintiri has in the past hundred days taken into cognizance the plight of the people of state, who had been suffering untold hardship due to the problem of accommodation and the sky rocketing of house rents charged by landlords in the state. To address this problem, the governor signed a Memoranda of Understanding to undertake the construction of 2000 houses to ease accommodation problem in the state. Governor Fintiri’s people-oriented ideas, analysts say, are meant to ease life for the common man in the state.
