Hon. Abba Muhammad is the pioneer Commissioner for Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development in Sokoto State. The ministry was established by Governor Ahmad Aliyu Sokoto  to create jobs for unemployed youths in the state in a holistic manner. Muhammad, who retired from the state Ministry of Finance as a Permanent Secretary in October 2024, spoke with select journalists on issues bordering on his current assignment. The Guardian’s ADAMU ABUH was there.

Congratulations on your appointment as the first Commissioner for Skills and Entrepreneurship Development in Sokoto State. How do you feel about the appointment?
First, I want to sincerely thank His Excellency Governor Ahmad Aliyu Sokoto for his confidence in my capacity to midwife this critical ministry that’s very  dear to his heart. And I want to ask for the support and prayers of all men of goodwill in prosecuting this assignment, because I can’t afford to fail.

From your intimidating CV you shouldn’t have any problem midwifing the ministry and surmounting any challenges  that may arise…
I absolutely agree with you that I am coming with a wealth of experience from both the public and private sector. So, on that note, I have what it takes to make a success of the assignment.

The most important factor, which you obviously haven’t taken into account and which in my opinion is very critical, is the unflinching support of the governor who in his wisdom and desire to equip the youth, the poor and vulnerable with the tools for a better future established the ministry. Governor Ahmad Aliyu Sokoto has never hidden his desire about giving the youth a future; he doesn’t believe in hands out. Again while every ministry is clearly important to him, some are obviously more dear to his heart in line with his Nine-Point Smart Agenda.

For instance, in the last two budgets,  education had more than 25 per cent of the budget. Health and agriculture, because of their capacities to provide food and raw materials for industries and employment for the people have received serious attention. There is nobody in the state that is surprised that the governor, who was once the Commissioner for Social Welfare under our father and leader, Senator Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko, created this ministry. The governor knows how important this ministry is, which is why he wasted no time creating it. And with  him solidly behind me, I don’t envisage any problem delivering on the mandate of the ministry.

You would agree with me that time is not your friend with  the huge unemployment crisis coupled with the fact that the governor seems to be in a hurry to address the problem. So how do you intend to proceed?

There are enormous challenges that we are faced with, because the Aminu Tambuwal administration abandoned the programme, which was initiated by the Wamakko administration, and which was up and running. So, as it is, we are starting from scratch. We are working closely with the Head of Service to second staff to the ministry. So far a permanent secretary and three directors have been posted to the ministry. I am optimistic that in no time the ministry would be fully operational.

We have also been allocated an office space. Immediately after my swearing in as a commissioner, the governor directed me to submit an inventory of the state of the various training facilities to enable him to make swift decisions. We have reported back to him and I know he is working on it. By the Grace of God, very soon the impact of this ministry will be felt by the good people of Sokoto State, Isha Allah.

I will keep going back to the grave damage by the previous administration, because its actions and inactions set the state back by more than 20 years. I consider their actions wicked, especially with the challenge of funding due to the economic downturn. Because of their actions the governor would be forced to source for funds to replace the various equipment that have been vandalised rather than deploying  the scarce resources on other areas. But the governor, being a prudent manager of resources, has assured me of his total support because it’s a project that is very dear to his heart. Naturally there are other challenges, but like you said they are not insurmountable. It’s just that we need time.

What’s the specific mandate of your ministry?
It’s important to stress that the governor has made significant progress in tackling poverty and in creating jobs. So, the mandate of the ministry is to create jobs by helping our people to acquire the necessary training. He wants to break the cycle of poverty. There are a lot of teaming youths that are interested in acquiring one skill or another, but the  training centres are not there nor do they have the resources to start their own businesses. This is the huge gap that the government wants to fill. We want to train them in basic book-keeping, marketing and in other areas that would help them to be better managers of their businesses. So, our major focus is to assist the teaming youths polish their skills so that they can create wealth.

It’s important to stress that we are going to work with them in their  areas of  interest. We want our products to be the best whether in tailoring, tiling or carpentry so that people can  talk highly of them like they talk about Ghanaians in terms of the quality of their products and skills in building. The other mandates include supporting entrepreneurship – those who already have businesses but lack the resources to expand them. So, we will be helping them in areas like marketing in addition to funding.  The governor wants to industrialise Sokoto State and has several programmes in place for the private sector. The advantages are numerous. He is looking at citizens that are gainfully employed and that can contribute to the Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) of the state, which would help fund social services.

Before now the ministries of Local Government and Social Welfare were involved in driving skills  acquisition programmes. Will your ministry be fully in charge of every programme that has to do with skills acquisition?
This is a very interesting question. I want you to understand the fact that even though the creation of jobs would be driven largely by my ministry, other ministries like the Ministry of Local Government and the Ministry of Digital Economy would definitely be involved in job creation. The local governments like you know are autonomous. That’s one of the Nine-Point Smart Agenda of the governor and so they have every right to initiate skills acquisition programmes. We are going to be the main vehicle but there would be synergy between the ministry and the other ministries, especially the Ministry of Local Government and also development partners to avoid duplication of efforts and ensure success. What we want is a better tomorrow for our people. We are not interested in taking credit. It would be a collaborative effort; the era of ministries acting in isolation is past.
We noticed that your governor usually gifts leather works to visitors to the state.

So, would leather works be part of the programme?
Absolutely! Sokoto State for more than 100 years has been historically associated with leather works. It would definitely be a priority area considering the fact that we have the raw materials and reservoir of  skills. Without sounding arrogant, Sokoto leather is one of the best in the world. So, we will provide them with the equipment and training to improve on their finishing because  it is critical.

About the gifts by the governor to visitors it would surprise you to know that some of them are produced by housewives. I am sure you will want to ask about people with disabilities. They are part of our mandate. Like the housewives that I spoke about, we have some visually impaired men who are actively knitting caps and cane chairs.

Our operating motto is how do we make them produce better products and to harvest the abundant talents towards self-reliance?
Everyone in Sokoto State is in Governor Sokoto’s programme. During the 2024 International Day of Persons Living with Disabilities (PWDs), he promised to introduce a special skills acquisition programme for PWDs in the state as  part of a deliberate effort  aimed at making physically challenged persons gainfully employed and to  reduce street begging. Clearly, these persons are close to the heart of the governor; so we must factor them into our programme as of right. There are 6,679 registered physically challenged persons benefiting from the monthly allowance from the government and the governor  plans to increase the number of beneficiaries to 10,000.

What number of unemployed people are you working with? And is your planning based on statistics?
As of 2024, we had about 31,594 unemployed people in Sokoto State, which represents about 1.2 per cent of the population of the state. This  is statistical data from the National Bureau of Statistics. So, with that number the state ought to have been spending about N3 billion yearly to address the unemployment problem. But most unfortunately, Aminu Tambuwal, for reasons best known to him, abandoned the skills acquisition programmes. He didn’t pretend that it wasn’t his priority and that his presidential ambition was all that mattered to him. The Tambuwal administration committed an unpardonable crime against the people of Sokoto State by abandoning well-thought out programmes, meaning that the gains recorded during the Wamakko administration were lost during the eight years of Aminu Tambuwal. We lost the sustainability. Now we need to assure the people that we mean business and that we won’t abandon them like Tambuwal did. This is the attitude of Governor Ahmad Aliyu Sokoto; no need wasting time on spilled milk. But we have a responsibility to explain to the world that Aminu Tambuwal was a tragedy.

So, technically you are starting afresh?
Yes, we are starting afresh. Thankfully, the man who initiated the programme under the administration of our father and leader, Wamakko, is now at the helm of affairs. It’s just that it’s going to cost the state huge resources to revive the various centres.
Have you identified the skills gaps that you intend to address?
We have engaged the services of a consultant to help us navigate the issues of skills, the training manual, duration and other issues. We are not unaware of skills that are going out of fashion. For instance, we used to have CD shops, a line of business that has been “killed” by technology. For example, with Spotify you can play millions of songs from your phone. So, we are taking such developments into consideration in terms of skills that might become obsolete so we  don’t have to go back retraining them again because the world is constantly in a state of change; we  have to accept that changes are part of life. So, we are very much aware that we have a duty to only train our people in skills that are relevant  to our people. So if it happens that a particular skill is no longer relevant to our society we will not waste our time going into it. We will definitely be doing things in technology, which is not going to be obsolete in the near future. ICT and digital skills are among the most sought after in the labour market; same with farming. We will also assess the skill level of participants.

Are you likely to have an incubation centre that  the government will equip because the government doesn’t need to buy 20 sewing machines for 20 people, which 40 people can actually use?
As I said earlier, part of what we have done was to undertake an assessment tour of the incubation centres. I have since submitted my report to the governor. They have suffered some dilapidation. We only need to effect  repairs for the various centres to start running.

In addition to the Tambuwal factor, have you looked at other  reasons why previous programmes failed to ensure your efforts don’t suffer the same fate?
You are damn right. So, in addition to the Aminu Tambuwal factor, we are looking at the attitude of the people – how to ensure that they take the programmes seriously. We are looking at how to provide them with the equipment. Thankfully we have some technical offices and they are giving us their opinions on how to guard against the problems that affected the previous programme. Some of our  people have this mentality that government property is not their responsibility. We need to change that mindset. Aminu Tambuwal  neglected the programme; he willfully neglected it. And it’s not restricted to this programme. He was an all round disaster, He abandoned roads and housing projects. He wasn’t paying salaries and pensions. Had Tambuwal continued on the foundation laid by Senator Wamakko, things would have been different.

How do you intend to evaluate the effectiveness of the various programmes to see if there is room for adjustments?
Without evaluations we can’t assess our efforts. So, we definitely would constantly be evaluating our participants. For us, the process would start by ensuring that they are counseled to go for what they have passion in. This is very important. And when they begin their training, it would certainly make our assignment easier. They will be subjected to vigorous training in book-keeping, marketing and other areas.

What are your projections?
We are ambitious, but very realistic in our projections. We don’t want to bite more than we can chew. But rest assured that we are going to give it our all. For instance, we have businessmen that are exporting onions to places like Ghana in large quantities; so we are going to work with them to make better profit, to remove bottlenecks. So, we need their statistics. They are earning foreign exchange for the country. The Sokoto State government is in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme to encourage dry season farming, to understand the climate change impacts, to know when to farm, when to harvest and to provide them with farming inputs. His Excellency has  supported farmers with farming inputs, seedlings and insecticides. Skills acquisition is jack of all trades and master of all.

So the duration would be three months?
Yes, three months. As I said before, we have some experience running skills acquisition programmes and the technical officers have assured me that three months would be adequate for the training, including hands-on experience. The maximum would be six months.

Let’s talk a bit of politics. You have always been in government. Do you think that Governor Aliyu Ahmad Sokoto has performed well so far?
Absolutely! And even the opposition PDP acknowledges the fact that Governor Sokoto has surpassed their expectations. They are our friends. We share notes; never mind that once in a while they will issue their toxic press releases alleging this or that. In less than two years, His Excellency has achieved what the Aminu Tambuwal administration couldn’t achieve in eight years. And this is a fact. He has completed abandoned projects, unlike Tambuwal who did not complete the projects that he inherited from Wamakko.

Is the governor’s second term guaranteed?
You know, power comes from God; that’s our belief. But considering his unprecedented achievements, I have no doubt in my mind that he would win the 2027 elections hands down. Governor Ahmad Aliyu Sokoto has worked tirelessly to touch lives because the people are the essence of government. They have stood by the governor. By last year the governor had completed over 180 projects. Under the first 100 days he vigorously attacked the projects that the  previous administration had abandoned. The people of Sokoto State are no  fools. They can see the roads, the schools and healthcare facilities and the governor is accessible to them because he is focused on Sokoto State and he is not using the position as a stepping stone for the Presidency.

Do you see Aminu Tambuwal permanently retired from politics?
His retirement from politics is already a foregone conclusion. He operates from Abuja. He has unfortunately abandoned his people. When the APC lost to the PDP in that controversial election of 2019, our leader and father didn’t abandon the state. Our governor was also here with us. And the people didn’t forget that fact. It’s always important to maintain relationships with people.

Are you saying Aminu Tambuwal is always in Abuja?
Yes! Sokoto State was just a stepping stone for him. He is still more preoccupied with the Presidency. He has never hidden that fact. The implication of his actions is that he has left his followers without leadership. They have been reaching out to our party to join us.

And what’s the reaction of your party?
We are taking them,  but we want to first look after the people that supported us. We recognise their fundamental right to join our party, but we are also not unmindful of the consequences when opposition elements cross over. We want to also be sure that they are not coming to create problems for our party. At the right time the party will accept those of them that genuinely believe in our party.

We must discourage people from moving from one party to another because they want to contest elections and after the election they become rebels. We want to help entrench democracy. We were worried because they started reaching out less than a year into the life of this administration.