Sacking over 4,000 Kaduna district, village heads a big security risk – APC leader
Chairman, All Progressive Congress (APC) AKIDA Executive Council in Kaduna State, Mataimaki Tom Maiyashi has said the recent sack of District and Village Heads in Kaduna State is capable of having serious security implication if proactive measures are not put in place.
Maiyashi, a former Commissioner of Education in the state bared his mind while interacting with newsmen in Kaduna on Monday that, the district and village heads play a major role in their various domain particularly in the areas of maintaining internal security and peace.
According to the elder statesman who is a grass root politician in the state, the decision of the state government to relieve a substantial numbers of the district and village heads of their jobs at this material time is certainly not a plus to the governing party.
To him, “traditional leaders that have lived with their people no matter how small are very important. They help to solve their immediate problems and challenges. They interact with their people and because they live with them, they could tell the truth of the matter and amicably resolve the problem.
“If there are challenges within their domain, the traditional leaders know what to do because they get information of any stranger within their domain, and the fundamentals of humanity is identity and community identity is very important”.
He said, if sacking them was due to lack of money to pay their salaries he said “the role the traditional leaders play to maintain law and order within their domain is far more than what they are paid as salaries.
“The state Government will pay more if there are security challenges, so why paying more when you can pay less by keeping them, infact, the most senior district or village head may not take home more than 50,000 as salary at the end of the month, some of them don’t live on their salaries.
“Government should rather do a capacity assessment of their roles to effectively carry out their jobs, and also organize a capacity building programs for them because we must not become a people without identity.
“Infact, the process followed to effect their sack is not correct, the committee constituted were all civil servants with no consultation with traditional leaders until their report leaked”.
He therefore called on the state Government to consider the possible security implication of their sack and reconsider it’s decision.
POSTED BY EDITOR (26-06-2017)