Kwankwaso's And Politics Of Education In Kano

Education is now being used as a tool by the former Kano governor Senator Rab’iu Musa Kwankwaso to remain politically relevant.
From his so-called abstruse free education policy introduced at the tail end of his second tenure in office between 2011 and 2015, to his sole intent of leaving the encumbrance to Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje.
His education legacy is simmered with hundreds of dilapidated education infrastructure in all the nooks and crannies of the state with a rehabilitation of a few on major roads and painted with the Kwankwasiyya inscription for public eye, in addition to the foreign scholarship scheme he initiated as the Governor of Kano state.
No doubt, Kwankwaso is among one of the prominent Nigerian politicians still exasperating in the defeat they suffered in the just concluded 2019 general elections.
The politician lost the Upper Chamber to Senator Ibrahim Shekarau who, roundly defeated his political god-son, but Kwankwaso was also dealt a big blow by His Excellency, Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje who was massively voted into office, the second time, by the good people of Kano state in appreciation to his uncommon achievements in all facets of governance, including education, during his first tenure.
To the chagrin of Senator Kwankwaso, Ganduje defeated his in-law and political god-son, Abba Yusuf; as a result, killing Kwankwaso’s (third-term) dream of returning to Kano Government House by proxy. Having been beaten hands-down, Kwankwaso is enveloped with the damning apprehension and stark realities of returning to political oblivion.
But he dusted his Kwankwassiyya Development Foundation wherein he recently organized a appeal fund for some selected First Class students.
The whole idea of the scheme is to re-launch himself into political relevance, a mission that turned out to become a mishap.  Before this, in a desperate move to placate the beneficiaries of the foreign scholarship and their parents, Kwankwaso had last year organized a fund-raising for some students. Only the Kwankwasiyya group can tell exactly what became of the proceeds of that fund-raising.
One would have expected that very important personalities, particularly the Kwankwasiyya chieftains would have attended the poorly organized event held to donate generously for the group, this explains why hoodlums had a field day, and the event ended abruptly.
Ironically, the chief launcher of that programme who made a pledge of N30 million is known to all as an average Nigerian still struggling to put food on the table, hence, exposing the real intent and purpose of the Kwankwassiyya fund-raising.
In all, the organizers claimed that about N87, 727.000 was realized during the fund-raising; but the real question remains, where is this money and how would it be distributed to the so-called beneficiaries?
Most pledges made by members of the Kwankwasiyya Group may not be redeemed.
It is against the backdrop of the empty promises that one Haroun Muhammad who identified himself as a Port-Harcourt-based Kwankwassiyya follower wrote a rather  satirical  article published in an online news portal, “First Reports”, titled: “Kwankwaso: The Sage Of Ours And A Legend Of His Own Time.” The same Kwankwaso who is being eulogized as the “father” of free education runs a private college in Abuja where students allegedly pay as much as N1.5 million!. In that very school, there is no student of Kano origin that is enjoying free education or subsidized tuition fee or scholarship even for the best brains of students from Kano or elsewhere in Nigeria. Who is fooling who?
Kwankwaso’s political tactics are well known to all. This is a man who testified that he benefitted from government’s free education from primary to university levels, but he introduced the foreign scheme during his second-tenure as Governor of Kano state to the detriment of Kano students sent out of the country with high hopes, but made to regret their decision of being part of a well-publicized government scheme.
Kudos to the policy of continuity of Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, who did not only offset the backlog of debts owed most of the foreign institutions, but paid for the student’s welfare which scaled up their academic performance. Ganduje inherited a defaulted educational structure, with the quality of basic education degenerating, leading to unacceptably low academic performance.
In virtually all public educational institutions, primary secondary or tertiary, classes were overcrowded. Basic amenities are either lacking or obsolete. As at 29th May, 2015, there were only 25,000 habitable classrooms out of the 30,000 available whereas the total requirement for our 3,000, 000 public primary schools is 45, 000 classrooms.
In addition to all these, instructional materials were inadequate while staff morale was at its lowest ebb and as a matter of fact about 50 per cent of the teachers were unqualified.
The Ganduje administration had to act swiftly by introducing far-reaching measures to reverse the ugly trend. The government reached out to the federal government in accessing the counterpart funding of about N2 billion, which Kwankwaso did not pay attention to.
This enabled the rehabilitation of classroom blocks to replace the decrepit ones, building libraries, sinking boreholes, provision of over 15,000 pupils’ furniture and instructional materials, etc.
Governor Ganduje also affirmed the need for community participation and therefore established the Education Promotion Committee (EPC) both at the state level and in all the 44 local government areas and provided them with a takeoff grant of N440 million, that is, N10 million for each local government. The committee used the fund to rehabilitate 490 blocks consisting of 981 classrooms, one block of two classrooms, provided 7,915 3-seater desks and various instructional materials.
Apart from project execution in the basic education sector, the Ganduje administration also remains committed to raising the morale of teachers through prompt payment of salaries and capacity building.
Over 30, 000 in-service trained teachers in 3 programmes; Nigeria Certificate in Education (NCE), Professional Diploma in Education (PDE) and Bachelor in Education  (B.Ed) have graduated or on the verge of graduation as part of effort to ensuring that only qualified teachers are allowed in our schools. Before the intervention, Kano had the highest number of unqualified teachers in the country. Other interventions include promotion of teachers, which has not been done for over a decade.
There is no gain saying that it is on the basis of Governor Ganduje’s grand commitment to educational development that led to the spiral increases in school enrolment and pupils’ improved performance.
The aim behind the foreign scholarship scheme of Kwankwaso’s administration has been defeated, as Kwankwaso left behind a  huge debt on the foreign scholarship scheme.
The Ganduje’s administration is painfully sustaining that programme, simply because of its policy of continuity.
The question still remains, how does the Kwankwaso or Kwankwassiyya political philosophy tally with these?
It is a well known fact that when Senator Kwankwaso left office, the state was in debt to a tune of N400billion, beside the numerous uncompleted and abandoned project scattered across the state. It is high time Senator Kwankwaso stop the politicization of education. He should halt putting the cart before the horse. I consider it hypocritical that while in office, he deliberately refused to provide for the basic education of our children by laying a strong foundation in the primary and junior secondary tiers of education, and now out of office, he wants to ‘mobilise resources’ to send them abroad merely for massaging ego and trying to ingratiate himself to the gullible children and their parents.
You don’t have to deceive the people just to warm yourself into their heart.