By; MOHAMMED KAWU, Bauchi
Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State has said that his administration would not rule with arbitration and subjectivity, but rather through the provision of legal framework and best established practices.
According to him, good governance could only be realized through appropriate legislation, hence the provision of legal and administrative framework, human capital, as well as the resources to smoothly run the government.
The governor who was speaking Friday while assenting to 12 bills earlier passed by the State House of Assembly, attributed the feat to the common goals imbibed by both the Executive and Legislative arms as attested by the partnership established between them.
“As partners in progress, both the Legislative and Executive Arms of the Government have the common goal of ensuring good governance through appropriate legislation as the global best practices is to provide legal framework”.
“We have to borrow from established practices and other climes which we are doing, and during our tenure and that of the Assembly, we will always congratulate ourselves for looking inward, using knowledge and driven by knowledge and best practice, and that’s why today we are signing twelve bills”.
He added, “I’m happy that myself and colleague the deputy governor and distinguished senator, we have really leverage on our cognate experiences, that we are working together with the Assembly to make sure we provide all these legal framework”.
Senator Bala Mohammed enumerated the assented laws as the Law Bauchi State Tourism Development Corporation, which when operational would create conducive environment for the development in the most economic and efficient manner of tourism, resort development, amusement parks and all services connected with such undertakings, among others.
It could be recalled that the state has the famous Yankari Resort and Safari, Sumu Park, and many other undeveloped tourism sites which the state government intend to unbundles them, hence the provision of the law as legal framework to boost the sub-sector.
Mohammed also signed the law to repeal Bauchi State University Law 2010 and enact a law to establish Sa’adu Zungur University which is just to change the name of the University which the State Assembly passed based on the recommendation of the State Executive Council to recognize Mallam Sa’adu Zungur, a respected individual, a nationalist, and a scholar of repute.
Late Mallam Sa’adu Zungur was also the former Secretary-General of the National Council of Nigeria and Cameroon (NCNC), a political party he and Dr. Nnamdi Azikwe, first President-General of the Federal Republic of Nigeria under a parliamentary system, championed in the Nigerian first republic.
Similarly assented to is the law to establish the Bauchi State Security Trust Fund, 2022 which essential would be the depository of all monies receives under the law for the acquisition and deployment of security equipment and such human and financial resources, and shall be found necessary for effective functions of all federal, state and local government security agencies operating in the state.
Borrowed from states such as Lagos that are operating this particular law, it is going to incentivized on the organized private sector and public spirited individuals to contribute money, including the state and local governments so that the infrastructural and service gaps of the security agencies would be flogged. The fund is going to be run by a board of trustees of distinguished Nigerians with security background.
Also signed is the Law to establish Bauchi State Environmental Trust Fund, which objective is to promote the development and improvement and sustainability of state environmental performance under a well-coordinated system that attracts funds from development partners and public spirited individuals for the protection of environment which the state is in a position to gain from such contributions.
The Governor thanked the State House of Assembly for painstakingly studying the bills sent to it before passing them into law, describing the cooperation as the show and attestation of the partnership that the two arms of government have always maintained between them.
He argued that Bauchi state is definitely left behind in the scheme of things and it has to work very hard to catch up, saying the state would immensely benefit from the laws, and called on the agencies concerned to ensure that the laws are conclusively implemented to the latter.
Out of the 12 laws that have been submitted by the Legislature for the assent of Governor Bala Abdulkadir Mohammed, eleven of them emanated from the Executive arm while one was a member bill.
