The Senator representing Kwara North senatorial district in the National Assembly, Sadiq Umar, has said that the current clamour to shift gubernatorial seat of Kwara State to Northern senatorial zone come 2027 was to harmonise all interests in the state.
He said the Kwara’s mantra of ‘State of Harmony’ will be incomplete if any section of the state is denied opportunity to produce governor.
He said the people of Kwara North would feel a sense of belonging in the event that the region is considered to occupy the seat of power in the state in 2027.
Umar said that the clamour for power shift to Kwara North was genuine and long overdue, saying that the region has not been fortunate to have any candidate from its extraction emerging as governor since the nation’s return to democratic rule about 24 years ago.
“That agitation can’t be more genuine than any genuine agitation. It is genuine as any genuine agitation, and I think this has been on for a very long time. We are all parts of the history of how Kwara North has fared. But to me, my honest and straightforward opinion about this is that it is not about agitation for Kwara North, it is about agitation for Kwara State.
“What do we say in Kwara State? We say Kwara is the ‘State of Harmony’. What is the technical meaning of harmony? It means everybody is living harmoniously, and it means that every section of the state must harmonise our aspirations and interests. So, if some regions have had the opportunity to produce the governor more than others, for a region like ours, since 1999, we have not had that opportunity.
“We are saying in Kwara North that the state has to give an opportunity to a Kwara northerner to also sit on the chair. Not because he is going to be a governor for Kwara North, he has to be the governor of Kwara State. But everybody will feel happy that the tripod is in harmony. So, if you say equity, fairness or whatever, those are grammar, but in democracy it is people who vote and make a choice of who they want to make as a governor. There is nothing you can do about that.
“But we are saying this in Kwara North because we don’t have that opportunity yet, let us make sure that Kwara State is a ‘State of Harmony’ by harmonising all our collective aspiration and then everybody will have that sense of belonging and we will be proud that the state lives in harmony. So, it is a very genuine agitation,” Senator Umar argued.