Pastor Stephen Haruna Bindas is the president of the Northern Nigerian Union Conference of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. In this interview with Correspondent, Nkasiobi Oluikpe, he spoke in unequivocal terms, that Nigeria isn’t getting it right because of the disenfranchisement injustice meted on the Adventist fold in Nigeria. Excerpts:
Your father named you, Ahamafule, and in Igbo language that literarily means, my name shall not be lost; having taken the name to several parts of the world as governor, would you say you are fulfilled?
I am a fulfilled man. My parents were not dreaming when they gave me that name. When my father was alive, as one of those who established contact with the earliest colonial masters in the South East, he used to tell me, when I was a child, that he wanted me to become a divisional officer (DO), the equivalent of a permanent secretary today. That was the target he gave me. In those days, the DOs were in charge of workers in different districts across the eastern region. I think he got excited with the DOs working with the Europeans because of the respect they commanded among the people. As a young man, I how could I achieve that? I had to join the civil service and I rose through the ranks. The moment I rose to the level of permanent secretary, I was not only satisfied, I was happy to have fulfilled the aspiration of my late dad. I am a fulfilled man after attaining that level. Any other feat I achieved was an extra from God. The seat of Governor I am occupying today is an additional blessing from God. I have other extra qualities in me, which make people gravitate towards me. For instance, in 2013, your establishment, Independent Newspapers Limited (INL), gave me an award as man of the year because of the service par excellence record of my government. Opposition parties that are castigating my performance were ignorant of that fact. INL is a reputable media house with top class publication that include Daily, Saturday and Sunday Independent titles; so those trying to castigate me are trying to rubbish the distinguished award given to me by your establishment. Apart from that, several media houses have given me awards in education, security, health and in other sectors. Those were testimonies to good governance and the impact we made in the life of the people.
Was it part of your aspiration to be governor or did it come after you became permanent secretary?
I told you about the target my father gave me, to become DO. Outside that, I was not looking forward to anything rather than meeting my father’s target. I never had the aspiration to become governor as a child. God made it possible.
In 2003, while other governorship candidates campaigned rigorously, you won the poll from detention; how did you do it?
That should tell you the level of my popularity. I have told a couple of people who thought it was easy to achieve that feat. I said to them, if they think that was so cheap to come by, then they should go and detain themselves first. Lock up yourselves and let us see how many votes you will garner. I was out of circulation when the election that brought me to government house in 2003 was conducted, yet I won. The electorate knew whom they were voting for. The people swore that I was the man they wanted and no other person. They resolved that no matter what happened, that even If I die in prison, they would vote for me. Again, that level of popularity was ratified during my second term election when I polled in 650,000 votes. My closet rival got 49,000 votes, so you can imagine the gap.
All was well between you your predecessor, Orji Uzor Kalu, when you were elected as governor on the platform of the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA) before both of you parted ways. At what point did you decide to distance yourself him?
It was when he was becoming over-bearing. When your predecessor decides to determine your fate as a governor, when his family members would like to determine everything you do as governor without any input from you, not everybody would accept that.
Not many governors survive disputes with their predecessors, where do you derive the courage to do that?
I derived my strength from the people. That has been the pattern in the state for a very long time and the people were polarised, until I came on board.
In future, is there any chance of reconciliation between you and your predecessor?
I don’t want to talk about him. I have to invest my time in other things. I don’t want to waste my time and energy discussing him. He is the one that keeps castigating me in his newspapers all the time. He has been sponsoring journalists to write against me but those who know me know that I don’t have time for that.
Which project is dear to your heart that you would cherish after leaving office?
Talk of the secretariat for the civil servants, high court, International Conference Centre, markets, the new government house and others, it is for whoever will take over from me, to consolidate on them. In Abia State, there is no room for contract inflation at all, every penny we pay to the contractors we negotiate every kobo there to the advantage of our people. You cannot come up with any fraudulent paper to claim the money for the job you have not done. You need to witness our argument with contractors at engagement level because we want our job done as specified.
As governor, what would you like to be remembered for?
I want to be remembered as someone that came to unite the entire state. Abia State used to be administered as a one-man show. Also, I would like to be remembered as someone who fought insecurity to a standstill. Abia State used to be a safe haven for kidnappers, but today the situation has changed. The people can now sleep with their eyes closed. Whatever you see people doing in the name of Boko Haram elsewhere, Abia State had its own share during the era of kidnapping. It was not easy to eradicate but we thank God for being our strength.
When kidnapping was rampant, some officers of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) were even kidnapped in your state; how did you stem the tide, so that others can learn from you?
It was through determination and commitment. We also developed good rapport and synergy with the security agencies. The populists were also part of it. We took time to carry them along because they were being traumatised to an abysmal level. I seized the opportunity to challenge the people that that was the time to rise against the criminals and they responded with great enthusiasm.
Unlike other states, your government never raised loan through the stock exchange, so how do you make it up to implement projects for the people?
Through prudent management, we got our priorities right in terms of execution and project implementation and shut the door against frivolities. We didn’t give room for wastage and show offs like unnecessary parties you may see elsewhere. We denied our selves of so many comforts and cut our coat according to our cloth. We put the people first in whatever we do.
How confident are you that your party’s governorship candidate, Okezie Ikpeazu, of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) would sustain your legacies, if he wins the election?
He has no option than to do that. Those things I have done that are good, he must continue. If there were things that I may have not done well, it is his responsibility to correct them. No human being is perfect. I may have made some mistakes. I expect him to correct them. Don’t forget that the electorate knows what is good or bad.
What are the things won’t be able to accomplish before leaving office?
In government, ideas flow on a daily basis. There is no time for you to assume that you can finish everything or you have the most brilliant ideas. As a governor, you have several ideas to compete with such that you may be at a crossroad to do certain things this way or that way. To us, in our deep conscience, we have done well for the people. I have the confidence that we are on the right track. However, you may think you are on the right track and some other persons may think differently. We are convinced that we are on the right path. When your conscience judges like that, you can go ahead. That is exactly what we have been doing since 2003.
Your party seems to be under pressure to curtail the challenge posed by the All Progressives Congress (APC) at this year’s general elections unlike the previous polls; why is this so?
It is so because APC is an amalgamation of several parties. This is the first time in the history of Nigeria that majority of the opposition parties will be uniting to face the PDP. However, let me tell you that we will defeat them at the end of the day because we have the people and the capacity to do so.
Not too many PDP governors have a healthy relationship with Mr. President; how have you been able to sustain yours?
President Goodluck Jonathan in the first place is a good man with humane qualities. He is a likeable person. That is the first attraction. As far as I am concerned, he has performed creditably well in office, given the programmes he has initiated for Nigerians.
Ubani Ubeku Market is one of your legacies, but how do you defend the relocation of traders from the heart of Umuahia to the new location?
It was an idea we implemented for the good of the people, to make life more comfortable and meaningful for them, as one of our campaign promises. The people were used to trading in the heart of the city by the roadside. We had to move the market to a location that afforded us the opportunity to build over 10 times the size of the market they were used to. That enabled us to expand the road network where they were and where they were relocated to within the town. It has led to positive reaction within the economic chain because now we have built a housing estate close to the market for those who may desire to live there. Within the market, we have security post, fire service, health facilities and several other things to make life more comfortable for them. There are shuttle buses plying the new market routes. From that, new channels of income are beginning to open to the people.
Despite your impact on the state, opposition parties are not at home with your performance, how do you react to that?
Which opposition will see the good thing in what you are doing when you are in government? That is their job. They think if they don’t do that then they have no job or they will cease to exist. It is only one of the opposition parties that confessed that we have done well in the area of security because it was obvious. The party’s governorship candidate gave us that credit saying it was not good for him to start castigating us for not doing anything. I laughed when I see them displaying picture of old roads in Aba to give an impression that I have not build a single road in that place since 2007. That is not true. Before now, the Port Harcourt Road through Isioma was impassable but we fixed that. The first overhead bridge there was made possible by me when the students were being knocked down by vehicles on the road. The roads I rehabilitated in Aba were the worst ones and people can testify to that. The people know how refuse used to overtake major roads in Aba before I became governor and the difference today such that there are no refuse dumps along the road anymore. The sanitation we have put in place has also curtailed a lot of things. Before, I became governor, I was in government, when former FCT Minister, Nasir el-Rufal, once said that Abia State government could not even remove the refuse in town. DAILY INDEPENDENT.
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