The ideals of patriotism, unity, and sound governance formed the foundation for establishing the Sir Ahmadu Bello Memorial Foundation.
Chairman of the Board of Trustees and former Governor of Niger State, Dr. Babangida Aliyu, stated this in an interview with Voice of Nigeria in Kaduna.
Dr. Aliyu noted that, the Foundation is committed to engaging both northern leaders and grassroots communities to raise awareness about government activities and identify areas that require urgent intervention.
“Some of his governmental policies I read, I appreciated his principles, his political stands, his personal honesty in terms of governance.”
“Sir Ahmadu Bello was a leader who do not attached material property or amassed wealth. When he died his personal account was in red. For me that is the kind of leader that we should have been producing right from independence not leaders who see leadership in terms of accumulation of wealth and selfish.”
“So the inspiration came from my little background and then associates coming with the idea of the foundation and I was lucky that, the Northern Governors 19 of us all agreed to to have it “
He reaffirmed the Foundation’s resolve to continue promoting the values and legacy of Sir Ahmadu Bello by supporting initiatives that encourage national cohesion and development.
Dr. Babangida believes that the foundation has come to stay in championing Northern development agenda irrespective of political affiliation.
“First, what we adopted was to say all the Northern Governors at their every meeting they should be able to take a position on matters for each state to implement. For example we too a decision to say within the first four years, the first concentrate on either education, health and social welfare and then infrastructure.
“More so that, Primary and junior secondary is supposed to be free. Many of us at that were able to implement the free Education policy and we stopped head masters and principals from taken money in the name of parents teachers Association,” Aliyu explained.
He noted that, the foundation will continue to work with the Northern stakeholders for an inclusive growth.