Who is this, I said to myself, wondering who would be promoting Nigeria in Burkina Faso at the time.
Full in Nigerian colors (a Nigerian track suit, a Nigerian fez cap and a pair of white canvass to match), he stood at the VIP box, close to the media tribune. His Nigerian apparel attracted me. It was distinct as one of the matches of the 1998 Nations Cup was going on in February, 1998. Nigeria was not participating. Sani Abacha had stopped the Eagles from attending the 1996 edition in South Africa because of the clashes his government had with South Africa who spoke against his dictatorship and state execution of environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa. CAF subsequently banned Nigeria and the Eagles couldn’t defend the cup they won in 1994 in Tunisia.
So, Nigeria was serving the ban at the time the Nations Cup was going on in 1998. And there at the stadium was a man wearing Nigerian track suit at a vintage position where all the top CAF members and other dignitaries sat.
This is news, I said further to myself. I’ll chat him up if he is a Nigerian and if he is not I’ll still ask him why the Nigerian colours. I was searching for news. I walked up to him. ‘Good afternoon,’ I said before introducing myself and asking if he was a Nigerian. He introduced himself and I was excited to know he was a Nigerian. “Nigeria is not participating but you’re here watching games”, were my first comments.
He said he just liked football and came because he knew there would be good games. He was in search of good football and I was equally searching for some tit bits, you would say. We chatted and became friends. I was surprised when he visited me at Ouga Deux Mille where I lodged. He drove. Did he hire a car in Burkina Faso to attend matches? No, Abdulrahman Abdulrazak drove from Lagos to Ougadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso in search of good football. He loved such adventures but most importantly he was and still is in love with sports.
This attracted me to him. No sports journalist would meet such a person and ignore him. We discussed football all through his stay. Egypt won their 4th Nations Cup title, beating South Africa 2-0 in the final. Benni McCarthy was voted Most Valuable Player. What he did in Europe in the following years proved his Burkina Faso performance was no fluke. DR Congo won the bronze and Burkina Faso were fourth. They were classed as minnows before the Nations Cup but Phillip Troussie did a good job to transform them into a strong team within a very short time. He had earlier qualified Nigeria for the 1998 World Cup finals but was sacked by empty heads running our sports.
They said he was not a world class coach and that’s how Serbian Bora Milutinovic came to reap where he did not sow. He took us to the World Cup in France and made a mess of a team full of individual stars. Under six months Troussier built for Burkina Faso a training camp for the national team and developed a strong team that promoted patriotism and fired up the entire country the way no team had ever done. Ouga Deux Mille was an estate built for ministers and top government officials. It was meant for use from the year 2000 as the name implies.
Burkina Faso finished the place in good time to lodge CAF and football officials during the Nations Cup. I was lucky to be allocated a beautiful bungalow there. That’s where Abdulrhaman came to visit me. Nations Cup over, and I returned to Nigeria.
“Will you be going to the World Cup in France,” he asked me in a telephone chat.
I was in USA ’94, I covered the Olympic Games in Atlanta and I would like my deputy, Tony Ubani to cover the World Cup in France. I have my accreditation but the only way I can cover the World Cup is if I secure sponsorship as Tony would be sponsored by Vanguard’, was my reply to Abdulrhaman. “That’s fine, see me in the office on Monday.” All the while I didn’t actually know the status of the man I met in Burkina Faso. He was simple, humble and very friendly. Sports is always a leveller. We just discussed football and his understanding of the game amazed me.
I never knew he played the game up to the level of representing Kwara as Emeka Obasi revealed in his column last year. He played in the junior team. I never knew he was from a top Nigerian family, son of First Republic minister, Alhaji Folorunsho Abdul Razaq who was the first northern lawyer.
I didn’t know many things about the man I met in Burkina Faso until months and years after. I got to his office at Ikoyi and a deal was struck. First Fuels, his company, would place their logo on sports pages of Vanguard Newspapers, the cost of which would cover the cost of World Cup coverage for one person in France. It was then I knew he owned First Fuels, an oil and gas company.
He was that big but very humble, down to earth, with no airs. He amazes all with his simplicity. And he is intelligent, very knowledgeable in diverse areas. For years I kept on hoping that he would someday serve Nigeria on a higher platform. He would fit into many capacities. If he spoke on the oil and gas industry you would pray Nigeria had such a man as petroleum minister. If it was sports Abdulrahman was more at home. He was to enrich my coverage of the African Cup of Nations in Mali in 2002 and in Tunisia 2004. He was there and did match analysis for SportsVanguard. His reading of games was brilliant and our coverage benefited from it.
I once wished he was sports minister or headed Agriculture, Social Development, Education, Works and Housing, Commerce and Industry etc. He was so versatile and I repeatedly told him I wished he was into politics to serve Nigerians. But I doubted his capacity to survive the murky waters of Nigerian politics.
That was my only fear for him. Such gentlemen with such brains lack the rofo rofo attributes of the typical Nigerian politician. He is a complete gentleman. However, many years down the line, Abdulrahman tried his hands in politics. Today he is governor of Kwara State with very high chances of being re-elected for the second term. His character has not changed. Still no airs, he drives himself to office, takes no salaries, generally remains as humble as ever. Elites Network for Sustainable Development, a civil society organisation can attest to the transparency of his government in all state projects. Award of contracts, their worth and execution are in the public domain. Indigenes are free to ask questions or make inputs.
Abdulrahman’s government also embarked on poverty alleviation programmes, pulling strings to transform the state. Just two years in office he received a sports award. Kwara United returned to continental football after more than a decade they performed such feat. And on January 27, Abdulrhaman would climb the rostrum at Eko Hotel in Lagos to receive Vanguard Governor Of The Year Award for 2022.
His achievements were many but summarily spelt out in Vanguard’s letter of nomination to him. It partly reads:
The Board of Editors of Vanguard Media Limited writes to notify you that you have been voted Governor of the Year 2022 for purposeful leadership.
We note the transformational leadership you have provided in Kwara State since assumption of office and its impact on the lives of your people.
Your administration’s interventions in key sectors: education, healthcare, infrastructure, industrialisation, agriculture and workers’ welfare, have taken governance to the remotest parts of Kwara.
In the education sector, your administration’s fidelity to its obligations and commitments has not only revived basic education but also revamped the tertiary education sector.
Under your watch, Kwara rose from being one of the states with the highest number of out of school children, to one with improved school enrollment figures.
This is in addition to the training and recruitment of quality teachers, building of new classroom blocks , payment of N7.1 billion debt and judicious application of counterpart funds.
The construction of several roads by your administration has impacted positively on the economy of the state, thereby reducing travel time, boosting productivity, and encouraging investments in agriculture. Several kilometres of rural roads and river crossings linking farming communities are targeted under the World Bank/Kwara partnership —this deal was made possible by your government’s payment of N400m counterpart funds between 2019 and 2020.
We recognize many ongoing and completed projects designed towards boosting the economic base of the state.
They include but not limited to visual arts centre, film factory, garment factory, innovation hub, and the international conference centre, Ilesha Gwanara Road, the Tunde Idiagbon Bridge, Adeta-Yebumot Road, Osi-Obbo Road, and the largest squash court in the country which is eight-winged, among many others.
Your private sector background provided a renewed commitment towards reviving moribund industries in the state. And you are achieving this working with development partners.
Upon assumption of office, you lamented inheriting a state with huge water scarcity, a situation that seems to have historical status in Kwara. Our findings in that space showed that administrative and technical issues responsible for perennial water crises in the state have received attention, leading to the rehabilitation of more than 14 water works and construction of two among other interventions in that space.
In the area of inclusiveness, we found it exemplary that the ratio of women to men in your cabinet is 50/50.-a feat never seen in the country.
You encouraged the enactment of a legal framework: Political Offices (Gender Composition) Bill 2021, which is arguably the first legislation of its kind in the country that places a ceiling below which government cannot go in the appointment of either gender for public offices. This is certainly a positive development in a society that struggles to attain 35 percent Affirmative Action.
These and many more earned you this prestigious award.
The philosophy of this award is to recognise and celebrate Excellence, National Pride and Service to Humanity.”
Congratulations, Your Excellency, many are proud of you and it is telling that the simplicity which you showed in our first meeting in Burkina Faso when you drove from Lagos to the place many, many years ago are still flowing in your life.
The story of a governor driving himself to office from his personal home among other peculiarities simply puts the helmsman in Kwara on a higher pedestal.
This award should serve as tonic to inspire more achievements for the people. However, knowing Vanguard Newspaper, don’t be surprised if they are the first to cast a stone in case of derailment. I hope you will not be distracted. Congratulations, once again.
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