Former Governor of old Kaduna State and elder statesman, late Alhaji Balarabe Musa, has been well known for his advocacy for good governance in the country. While he's no longer with us, and we'd certainly miss him for his stance on a number of issues in the country, we take a look at one of his interviews back in 2017, where he said the North has been the source of troubles in the country, because the region is 40 years behind the South in education.
He said even if there's a radical awakening in the region, it would still take years to make significant progress.
He described the North as a troubled child of the country because of the misrule of political leaders and a skewed system of deprivation left by the colonialists in the North.
He said, “The North is truly behind, but it is not only the North that is in trouble. The whole country is in trouble. The North is not another country. The problem in the North, as far as education is concerned, is a gap which it inherited from the British colonialists. And I have estimated that this gap in educational development between northern Nigeria and the South is a 40- year gap.
“This means that the North is behind the South in educational development for at least 40 years. This shows that even if the North wakes up today and takes a revolutionary step to bridge the gap, it will take the North 40 years.
“You know the position of educational development in national growth. This is the reason why the North is a troubled child and has never allowed Nigeria to have peace , unity and progress. It is not possible for the northern people with this unequal human capacity to participate actively in their affairs. They will always be the source of trouble.
“I believe this problem can be tackled by the government bringing a free, compulsory primary and secondary education throughout Nigeria. The government can afford it.
“We have had many presidents from the North but what benefits have they done to the North? Presidents also came from the South - West and South - South. In what ways did those presidents benefit their regions ? None. Therefore, we need to sit down as a country and tackle our problems collectively.”
The late elder's statement was recently restated by the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, who said that Nigeria is struggling to make progress because the North is backward as it struggles with many problems including, poverty, illiteracy, insecurity, and religious intolerance.
He said, "The elites are our problems. The elders are our problems."
“The north of today is not the same north Sardauna wanted to see or had dreamt about. It’s not the same north that our children now roam the streets, begging for food in the name of Almajiranci. It is not the same north in which Sardauna wanted all our girls to go to school and he was very passionate about girl child education. It is not the north that he has built and left a very solid foundation and it is now left for our politicians to build on that foundation."
In a separate criticism of Northern leaders, he said, “We have lots of documents from several meetings and conferences submitted to the leaders and they have gone into the shelves. We have the solutions to the northern problems.
“Agreed, it is not possible to solve all the problems at once, so, we can do it in phases. But I must say, we do not lack the solutions, what we lack is implementation and honesty. We are not honest with ourselves and if we are not honest, we will continue to suffer the consequences.”