Yari backs restructuring, state control of resources

ZAMFARA State Governor Abdul'aziz Abubakar Yari has said Nigeria needs a true federalism to address the imbalances in the polity.The governor made the declaration on Monday at the Government House, Gusau, when he received the final report on the assessment of primary schools in the state.He said some states of the federation were forced to become poor because of the federal system being operated under the present constitution.Nigerians, Yari said, ought to be developed educationally and economically, but lamented that they were wallowing in abject poverty because of the control of state resources by the central government.Under a true federal system, the governor said Zamfara can develop its key sectorsto gainfully engage the people if it had absolute control of the abundant mineral resources and authority to export its farm produce.'Sometimes, I keep on asking the kind of system we are operating in Nigeria and that is why we are asking for a true federalism in Nigeria. We in this part of the northern part of the country, when we hear anything about federalism, start thinking of poverty. But I believe we are going to have solutions to the abject poverty we are in. We cannot continue in this situation of dependence on the so-called oil or food basket,' said Yari.The governor also blamed the country's economic managers for misleading leaders on inflation when the money meant for development is being doled out to a few citizens for frivolous projects.He promised to study the reportand implementation without further delay.Presenting the report to the governor, chairman of the committee, Prof. Tukur Adamu, said the document was divided into five units with suggestions for the government to implement.He said the committee was able to visit all the 1,420 primary schools, screen credentials of the members of staff, as well as observe teaching in the classrooms.Adamu said: 'Of the 8,660 teaching staff in the primary schools, only 3,113 or 35.95 per cent are qualified. A number of schools don't have single structure. They operate under trees or in make-shift structures, in mosques, and sometimes share classrooms with Quranic schools.
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