Nasiru Yusuf

Ahead of the 2023 general elections, an advocacy group advocating for Good Governance and total liberation of the Nigerian masses “The Nigeria Agenda” has reaffirmed Commitment in enlightening Nigerians importance of choosing a leader who has Nigerians at Heart.

KANO FOCUS reports that The Nigeria Agenda comprises members of various political parties, civil society organisations, students, trade unions and community-based organisations.

The Chief Advocate of ‘The Nigeria Agenda’, Niyi Akinsiju appealed to Nigerians to elect credible candidates who have the capacity to take the country to promise land irrespective of their religion, ethnicity or geographical location.

Mr. Niyi Akinsiju

Akinsaju made the call during the inauguration of the movement in Kano and interactive session with the Civil Society Organisations, CSOs who are saddled with responsibility to step down the project to the grassroots.

Akinsaju said, “there is a need to band together in conscientious vertical and horizontal solidarity, the more than 280 different tongues-ethnic groupings, divided along the two mainstream religions, must transform into active leadership recruitment officers, conscious of their rights, duties and responsibilities as Nigerian citizens and made potentates in the democratic space by jettisoning base appeals to primordial differences. And, as a collective, demand of leaders, the requirements of social progression, economic growth, security of lives and properties at all tiers of government. And to that extent, emplace leadership that will ensure inclusiveness, transparency in government, and integrity in the business of governance rather than those that will excuse abysmal performance or criminality in the conduct of government on the smokescreen of ethnicity and religious persecution.

“This translates to making political leaders answerable for their deeds in office to the citizens; to ensure compliance by leaders to ethos of equity, equality, right of access to material assets, to justice, and to the enjoyment of unhindered peaceful existence anywhere we may find ourselves within the Nigerian geographical space without let or hinderance.

“These are the pillars on which the The Nigeria Agenda is pivoted, and to which we invite you to review and adopt, and to join us to amplify and propagate across Nigeria, conscious of our Nigerianess”.

He added that, “But as we aspire for greater economic returns and ennobling social conditions, the significance of recruiting the right kind of leadership at all tiers of governance to facilitate these is crucial. This is where the Kano political paradigm that I had romaticised earlier, applies; the recognition of our inherent and growing unity as a people because of our shared history and experiences, and the need to galvanize the capability to make leaders responsible and answerable to the people by acting and thinking beyond cleavages of our differences in the recruitment, evaluation and monitoring of the performances of political leaders.

“The Talakawa of Kano were able to transcend primordial sentiments by bonding around the virtues and attributes of their commonalities to achieving political ascendancy through  solidarity of a single mindedness to dominate the political space for the good of the people.

“Indeed, the choice of Kano is the outcome of a rationalisation that was premised, not only on the city’s central positioning in Nigeria’s Northwest geopolitical zone, but more significantly, because of its robust history of citizens’ engagements made manifest in the historical sublimity of the Talakawa political culture and tradition that still define the politics of the city and to a large extent, the politics of the State in contemporary times.

“Thus, while citizens, especially of the social and economic category perjoratively described as commoners, in other states of the Nigerian federation, in bemoaned their burden of existence and listless fate under a political system materially dominated by an elite minority, which is usually driven by narrow self interest that mostly bothered on selfish expropriation of collective patrimony, the Kano commoners, the Talakawa, had long ago found and aggregated a common social, economic and political identity and purpose in their numbers. And, earlier than any citizens’ movement anywhere in the country, made commitments to not only the contest for democratic power, but to, by concrete class action, insist on making the people the centre of both government and governance working through the covenant inherent in the Sawaba Declaration of Principles of 1951.

“This inaugural advocacy of The Nigeria Agenda is held here, in Kano city, in deference to this precocious act of political self enablement and activation, consumated about 71 years ago under Mallam Aminu Kano, the teacher, whose boundless humanism inspired a mass based peoples ideological movement and a political trend that is still a reference item in the simplicity of its context and at the same, its conceptual sophistication which helped the ordinary people overcome spurious divisions in their ranks. And, in honour of those patriots that have continued to propagate and sustain the ethos of that era.

“Whilst Kano’s political and ideological pedigrees provide a strong ground to host this advocacy, we equally find an alluring proposition in the testimonials of the political activism of its political history, which continues to evolve through contemporary times, as a paradigm of adaptation for The Nigeria Agenda,” Akinsiju however stated.

Others who spoke at the occasion include former Adamawa state commissioner of information Ahmed Sajoh, Chairman Council of Ulama, Kano State Shiekh Ibrahim Khalil and factional Chairman of All progressive Congress APC Kano Chapter Ahmadu  Haruna Zago represented by Idris Haruna Zago.

Shiekh Ibrahim Khalil

Meanwhile, it was gathered that the project will be extended to all six geopolitical zones.