…says l’ve over 30yrs public service experience to achieve it
…Adamawa has multi-talented people to help me use our agrarian nature catapult us to greater heights
Ambassador Jameel Zubair Abubakar Waziri is an accomplished career diplomat spanning over three decades. He is the Mutawalli of Adamawa and graduate of Comparative Languages Studies from the prestigious King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
A one time State Chief of Protocol to former President Goodluck Jonathan and various times Ambassador to Asian, African, European countries in this chat with TheNewsGuru.com, Regional Editor, North spoke extensively on his career, his blueprint of how he intends to transform Adamawa into Africa’s food hub if elected Governor of the State in 2023.
What is it that is so special that you intend doing in Adamawa government house that others have not done?
Thank you, like I always try to talk to people in my area, Adamawa as a state is an agrarian state needs the kind of development that will put it at a pedestal equal to any other state in Nigeria. But what that requires is the kind of leadership that will take them up there.
Adamawa has been right from the word go, a citadel of both culture and civilization and education. Over the years it has been dwindling and that is because we have not had the kind of leadership that will pull it out of the doldrums and push it forward.
That is why I am contesting for that governorship and by the grace of God when I get it, I will bring all the experiences I have garnered over time, over thirty something years of public service, both locally and internationally and expose the governance system of Adamawa to international best practices.
And that is the kind of leadership that we need to prop up Adamawa. Adamawa has so much potentials to be a great state, not just a good state, a great state.
We have agriculture, we have human resources, in fact talented human resources. If you go by history, you will know the kind of people that came out of Adamawa.
So these are the kind of things I would like to take back home and help my people attain that level of development.
What you are saying in a nutshell is that you are going to tap on the human capital then at the same time, you will bring a lot of developments into the agrarian nature of Adamawa, how do you intend to achieve this, are you going to go mechanical or otherwise?
In most of Western Europe, you know agriculture is the mainstay of their economy, and agric business, animal husbandry is the key to development and Adamawa has it in abundance, once we exploit that commercially, businesslike, it will give Adamawa the kind of resources that we are looking for development.
We don’t need to go cap in hand begging federal government for resources, we can generate enough resources in Adamawa to sustain that state for a development that is enviable and I believe we can do it.
We have resourceful human beings in Adamawa, industrial by nature, highly educated people, all they need is a steering that will direct them to the right direction.
And animal husbandry like we said, we are talking about cattle ranching and all these type of things, if we are able to harness that in one place and provide the enabling environment for that kind of business to flourish, it will go a long way.
To start with, let’s look at the cattle, it is a resource that is completely useful, when I say completely useful, when you have a cow, every part of that cow is useful commercially. The bones you can use it for pharmaceutical companies or even writing chalk, the skin you have leather although some people do use it as a delicacy, the blood is collected and it is also used industrially, you can have different grade of meat.
You know Nigeria almost always import meat from South Africa, Namibia when we have it in abundance here.
If you put Adamawa and Taraba together, they can replace the kind of resources that we think we are getting from the oil fields and agric business in my opinion is the best way to go and I am sure we will be able to put at least, a take off point for people of Adamawa to build up.
I always say government has no business in business but government can put enabling environment for business to flourish and that is the kind of programmes we want to execute in Adamawa.
What is that message you want to send to the average citizens of Adamawa state, why they should vote for you if you get the ticket?
To my people of Adamawa, we know where we have been, we know where we are now but it is not clear we know where we are going to. If I am given the chance, I have the clear vision and the determination and vigor to take Adamawa to that place where everybody will look back and say, oh, it had derailed before, now we are on the right path and that is my covenant with Adamawa people to raise an egalitarian, politically dependent, economically viable, socially coherent state.
So much so that when you go to Adamawa state, the kind of inclusiveness you will see; you know Adamawa is a diverse state with a lot of cultural differences, tribal and other things.
But that diversity is not really a problem for us, it is a tool for us to come together and explore the different cultures and resources that we have for development and I promise, together, we can do it.
What is the meaning of Waziri?
Waziri is a title given to prominent persons in Adamawa, actually it is the chief adviser and in other parlance, it is the prime minister, as in Adamawa as the prime minister, after the emir, you have the prime minister.
If you follow the history of Adamawa, it has been an Islamic kind of state, so that is the administrative system that was established; so Waziri is the prime minister.
It is the title that is given to a learned person, a courageous person, a person with enviable character and traits.
How is your early life like/ career experience?
My name is Mohammed Jameel Zubair Abubakar Waziri, I come from the Waziri family and I was born in Yola by the couple of Alh. Zubair Abubakar Waziri and Fadinato Amidulali.
Maternally my mother also comes from a noble family in Jimeta Yola and they have been the elders who are cooperated and collaborated with the emir to set up the emirate, Adamawa Emirate.
I was born in 1957, I started my primary school in Mustapha Primary School in 1963. However because of the nature of my father’s career, I had been in different schools at different times.
My father for example in 1965, my father was posted to the Republic of Mali and meanwhile the civil war broke out and I could not come back and there was no English school in Mali, so I stayed for almost 3years without going to school.
However when I came back I got enrolled back in Central Primary School Jimete Yola and on completion I went to Vilanova Secondary School, it is a mission school; the school was merged with former craft school and it later became comprehensive school.
Now having gone through the missionary kind of education, on completion my parents felt as a Muslim, a good and devout one for that, I should also have a good understanding of my religion.
So I was admitted at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah but prior to starting my university education, university degree, I had to do a language course because I could not do Arabic when I went there. So I did a language course for 2years and later joined the mainstream college.
I studied comparative language studies.
I will give you a scenario, I was there when in 1982, 83, the then president Shehu Shagari visited Saudi Arabia official visit and when he came, the official interpreter did not come with him, so I was co-opted to translate for the president though unofficially because I wasn’t certified as an interpreter but I had a very good command of the language, so I did it and that was how I was removed from Saudi Arabia, asked to come back and do my job here.
When I finished the university programme, I came out with flying colours and I was given a graduate assistant job in King Abdulaziz University and I was being paid very well.
But in spite of that, since there was a special request by the president for me to come back and being a patriotic person, I decided to throw away the large sums of money I was getting as salary and come back to Nigeria and coming back I was posted to state house for my NYSC.
On completing my NYSC, I was absorbed into the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and still seconded to state house.
As history would have it, shortly after that, General Mohammadu Buhari took over government, I was with them until 1985, when the late General Idiagbon went to Mecca, I had the painful duty of being on that trip with him because I served as a translator, interpreter, we were there when the coup happened and I had to stay with him until the time he was called back.
Babangida took over, I worked with Babangida till 1990 as senior protocol officer, principal protocol officer before he moved back to Abuja in 1991, that was the time when I requested that I should be allowed to go back to the mainstream ministry because I was rising in rank but I did not have the cognate experience on the desk in the ministry.
And you can imagine that if you go back at a very high rank and then your juniors are the ones who are teaching you the job, it is laughable, so I went back in spite of the attraction of the presidency.
I was posted to Iraq, I arrived Jordan on my way to Iraq and the Gulf War started, just when I was about to leave Jordan; so I was stocked in Jordan for 7months before I was cross posted to Algeria.
I worked in Algeria as the Head of Chancery and part of the political desk. I was also there when I witnessed the assassination of the late President Budiaf at a conference in Tetua.
After my service there, I came back home but I was still asked to go back to Morocco. Apparently most of my tours are within the Arabic speaking countries understandably because of the Arabic bias.
I served in Morocco during the era of General Abacha, I only came back in 1997 and then I was in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs briefly.
I was posted again out to the United Kingdom, I was there and I served in different desks, ultimately I became the chief of protocol in the Nigerian High Commission and after my service in London I came back to Nigeria.
I was scouted by the office of the vice president, and deplored there as special Assistant Admin. I worked for a couple of one or two years when he became the acting president and he made me his protocol liaison officer.
When he assumed office as the president of Nigeria, a year later he made me the State Chief of Protocol. I was conferred with the title of Ambassador because you cannot be the State Chief of Protocol who is liaising with all the foreign missions in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, coordinating the conferences, seminars and other high level meetings of the president without that title.
At the end of Mr President’s tenure, after he lost the election, I worked just for two, three days with the new President Mohammadu Buhari but then they appointed a new State Chief of Protocol so I reported to Ministry of Foreign Affairs until my retirement in 2017.
