I am a friend to Sanusi Lamido Sanusi since his MSSN days. Even if Abdullah Ganduje the naive Governor of Kano state did not remove him, with his radical approach to life and the power bestowed on our Governors by the constitution, one Governor one day would still remove him.
SLS is one of the most cerebral, dynamic, creative and intelligent minds in this country.
Unfortunately, when Allah was distributing diplomacy he wasn’t around. He is blunt to a fault and ventilate his strong opinion without caring whose ox is gored.
Today is a sad day for me when I reflect what Islam and the populace would lose without a sagacious and intellectually endowed person like SLS.
When Sharia was introduced in Zamfara and Kwankwanso acting the scripts of Obasanjo was fidgety to follow suit, SLS wrote an article that was an advertorial in many newspapers. He lambasted the erstwhile Governor for not being sensitive to the yearnings of the people of Kano who cherish their Islamic heritage. SLS was then a General Manager at UBA where Kano state Government had substantial lodgement.
Kwankwanso asked UBA to sack SLS or lose their lodgement in UBA. The management of UBA appealed to SLS to apologize to the Governor but instead of apologizing, he resigned his appointment as a General Manager in the Bank.
Immediately he left UBA, he was offered the post of an Executive Director in First Bank from where late Yar’adua appointed him as Governor of the Central Bank. It is on record that he stabilized our Banking system and got rid of the bank executives who were feeding fat on depositors Funds.
It was his fertile brain that created AMCON that allowed investors with beautiful ideas to have access to funds without much hassles. It was after Sanusi’s exit from the Central Bank that AMCON was bastardized and investors started buying private jets from the AMCON loan.
When he resumed at the Central Bank, he criticized the big emoluments of the National Assembly saying it was not sustainable.
The National Assembly was furious and invited him to ask for an apology. He refused telling them they can sack him because his father’s name was not GOVERNOR OF CENTRAL BANK.
When he finished with the National Assembly, he accused the Jonathan administration that there was a twenty billion shortfall of oil money remittance to Federal purse. He came with incontrovertible evidence of kerosene sale racketeering by top government officials that went into billions of naira.
He prognosticated that if oil price should go below sixty dollars Nigeria would go into recession and his prediction was proved right at the end of the day. His criticism of the theft of oil sales led to his sack against the constitutional provision by president Jonathan. By Allah’s providence and against Jonathan Government’s position, he became the Emir of kano.
The radicalism in his blood would not make him appreciate that there is a need for diplomacy in royalty. He was not comfortable with what he regarded as the lackluster performance of Ganduje and he publicly campaigned against his second term.
Immediately, Ganduje won, his immediate agenda was to remove Emir Muhammad Sanusi from power. Many spurious and unsubstantiated allegations were put on his neck.
When all the committees set up to remove him were hampered by court actions, Ganduje decided on a kangaroo move which culminated in the removal of the 13th Emir of Kano Muhammad Sanusi the second today. That was the same fate that befell his grandfather in the regime of late Sir Ahmadu Bello late premier of the then Northern region.
Definitely the last has not been heard of the Emir of Kano saga. We expect a lot of legal gymnastics. The erstwhile Emir would definitely fight back since he was not given a fair hearing.
Sanusi Lamido Sanusi is expected to spend his palace on exile in Nasarawa according to tradition.
