Truth be told, I cannot lay claims to knowing the Plateau State Governor, Barr Simon Bako Lalong to the point of holding fort for him, however, if there is nothing that may attract you to him; I am nonetheless challenged by his humility. It is the price he has paid from being a local Nyak boy to the exalted position he now occupies. Only God can be responsible for such a transformation.

For those who do not know, Governor Simon Bako Lalong came to our aid when I served as state chairman, Nigeria Union of Journalists. My colleagues had given us the nod to establish an Endowment Fund for the purpose of helping journalists who had challenges, without resorting in most cases to government, corporate and individuals for assistance.

Pronto, when he was informed that we needed his assistance to get a link to then Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, who has had a personal relationship with him, he agreed without hesitation. That opened for the Council, the doors by him: Not only did the Rivers State governor agree, he represented him on the launch date and donated a whopping sum of N7m to the Fund. He didn’t charge nor ask us for a penny; as he had to travel to Port Harcourt several times for the task.

I thought you needed to know the details, so that what you are reading will not be misconstrued as patronizing. If you thought so, I have a hundred reasons why he deserves to be supported. But these four may suffice: He is governor of my state and he had come to my aid in the past, when at that time he was out of power as Speaker and needed to also ‘struggle’ to take care of himself and family. Studies had made us cross our paths in Keffi and Zaria; but more importantly, the Bible admonishes that I pray for those in authority, whether we support them or not.

In the last couple of years, Governor Lalong has come under intense attack on the social media and other platforms. As usual, he has maintained his cool without ‘hitting’ back at the band of his attackers; knowing him as many do, his humility would not let him. But occasionally, we have had explanations from his media managers; and I know that such may not be satisfactory to the army of young men and women demanding more of such about his performance.

They think and believe more needs to be done. But I am at a lost when we got to this station. The question to ask is: Who has bewitched us as to descend to this despicable level of hating one another for a cause that we can’t even explain? The hatred is spread as if our future depended on the dose that are sent into the hearts of community members; whose gullibility is exploited to maximum advantage, but to our chagrin and disadvantage.

Criticism of any nature if well conceived is to the advantage of the state and or any society. While any that is ill-conceived drive motives that are insipient with destruction in tow. Make no mistake; there is a place of criticism in government, as well as holding our leaders accountable to their actions, no doubt. We have had governments in the state that were bashed from all fronts, Lalong’s from all intent and purposes have largely been embroidered with grains of ethnic hatred.

Let me enter a caveat here: I hope this makes sense at the end of your reading. This is not a publicity stunt for the government; I believe the media managers of the Governor are indeed capable and able to come to his defence of the many areas a number of people are asking questions about.

I did not listen to the altercations between the Reporter of JayFM and the state Commissioner for Information and Communication, Dan Manjang a couple of weeks ago. I made efforts to, but discovered it had been yanked off from the station’s platform. How ingenuous they could be! Such always happens, if the station believes that it may work against their business and or had injured the person involve.

Those who followed the interview discussion have different opinions about what took place. I have reason to believe that issues of governance, particularly here in Plateau take dimensions when they come up for discussion, obviously for reasons that may take nomenclatures that are laced with divisive tendencies.

The manner of the ‘ethnic mongering’ and ‘political disagreement’ are alarming, just so that ‘the worse of the Plateau man’ is clearly displayed and could even make us vulnerable to various pursuits which may not favour our togetherness. Our concern is to kill the drift and recalibrate understanding for the future.

In the course of all these, over time, we have witnessed vicious hatred, vitriolic castigation of his person and office; and indeed of his tribe. Those who know, governance on the Plateau has remained largely a thankless job, no thanks to a band of young men and women acting on various fronts of frustrations and inhibitions they believe government has placed on their path to cast aspersions on those in authority. 

Prof John Wokton Wade, the Director General, Directorate for Research and Documentation, Government House has an ingenious way of describing the personality of the governor. A few weeks ago after reading a post titled ‘The Lalong Enigma’ by Nde Jonathan Ishaku, a man who has remained a model in journalism; I arrived at the conclusion that the drift has got to be refined by schooling this band of young men and women to have an introspection of their attitude to governance and criticism.

The avalanche of criticism against the governor and his administration are so nuanced in the social media space, so much so that one may imagine that everyone in this government has had nothing to offer. That is a rather sour conclusion from a band that feeds on costly assumptions. Note that criticisms are expected, but when they are from imaginations, they create more problem than their solutions.

In that post, he had described the governor thus: ‘Lalong the cowboy, riding high on the Horseback’. What that means is that the governor, whose humility knows no bounds, is increasingly rising as a cowboy would use the back of a horse instinctively protecting and aiming steadily from relative obscurity to where he has found himself today; even if he may not have succeeded in all endeavours as the governor.

God may have used a number of people to catapult him to where he is today; that is enough reason to believe in the efficacy of the powers of God to raise men from grass to grace. It is understood, much was expected of him when he rode to Government House. The question to ask is: Have we remained where we used to be since 2015?

Depending on which side of the divide you may be placed, an answer to his style of governance may be acerbic and caustic; however for many others, they may circumspect as to where we are coming from with a view to correct and move ahead with our development.   

From what we may have observed, it will be difficult for the youths to be dissuaded from criticizing; as they know they have a responsibility to hold leaders to the best of standards, even if they have to bring the heavens down. The manner may be harsh and or nice, it is the responsibility of the leader to read through and discover if he needs help from the myriads of ‘the noise of malice or avarice or politics or sycophancy and do what they should do. Whether it is said with sugar topping or served with bitterness. We pamper politicians too much and that’s why we get what we get: Underperformance, entitlement, arrogance. Little wonder our leaders will never understand that leadership is about service’.

The tilt towards the hatred for one another rather than the pursuit of other engagements opened to us is not for the want of better things; they are consistently recruited and found willing tools in the hands of ‘aggrieved and failed politicians’. The fact that they are sacrificing their future to be engaged for motives other than challenging endeavours and initiatives which the state should address could be areas that need attention to give them a desired end.

It is in this regard that the government is challenged to encourage the youth (not) to dissipate their energies but put them to productive usage. Truly, I am aware of challenging entrepreneurial initiatives by the Haggai Gutap-run Plateau Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise Development Agency (PLASMEDA) that has made younger persons acquire skills that will help them stay off the streets by creating over 50,000 jobs. If the state concentrated on implementing SDGs, and I know Plateau has leapfrogged several states in that regard. There cannot be hindrance to the expression of their potentials, if we consider that the following agencies: Plateau State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, Plateau Rural and Urban Water Agency and the Plateau Information and Communication Technology Development Agency (PICTDA) are up and doing to change lives and communities.

To address these challenges, we must know that if the state administration focuses its attention; as it has done, towards attaining SDGs that are spread across education, health, human capital development, job creation and infrastructure development, but particularly peace and justice for an inclusive society, we can change the direction for the state and assuage feelings that may sound genuine but badly couched.

But the issue is: “We cannot all be praise singers, we cannot all be critics. We cannot all be quiet. The course of society is advanced when there is a fair mix of all three categories. Young people should not be told to lower their expectations, or how to express their disappointments. There are (constructive) criticisms that are aimed at achieving some positive changes, adding value or pointing to a direction. On the other hand, there are criticisms that are aimless, self serving, misleading and, sometimes, vengeful. Examining the motive of the criticisms often gives a clue about the purpose. These days of politics sometimes pure undiluted hatred is the basis of criticism; whether such hate emanates from politics or ethnicity I consider it destructive.” At this point, I dare to say that the ideals of “not too young to run” for the benefit of all and sundry must be embellished with sustainable mentorship in civic education and leadership.