by Zara Mustapha

Senate President, David Mark yesterday opened up on how late Senator Dahiru Kuta was jailed on his orders while he served as the military governor of Niger State.

Kuta, a two-term senator, died on June 12 in Lagos on his way abroad for medical treatment. He, until his death, represented Niger East senatorial district in the Senate.

Members of the late Kuta’s family held a valedictory session in his honour of the Senator yesterday.

The session was attended by the Governor of Niger State, Mu’azu Babangida and David Mark who recalled how he ordered Kuta to be thrown in jail several times for daring to storm his office in protest against the dissolution of Niger State House of Assembly in which Kuta served.

ThisDay reports:

According to Mark, he had to order him imprisoned several times because he perceived him to be daring and confrontational as a result of his relentless courage to accost him as a military governor with a protest letter.
Mark further said he was forced to put him in jail several times because Kuta refused to be cowed by his numerous incarcerations and instead always returned to him to perpetuate his protest immediately after every release from prison.

“I first met Kuta when I was posted to Niger State as a military governor and I narrated the story to my son and I think I narrated the story to a few of you here. They were all very young, very agile, very energetic, very radical in their presentations and thinking. Sometimes, I thought they were overzealous but all very patriotic and nationalistic. The other gentleman is in the chamber here today. When Kuta came to me a couple of times, I asked him ‘who gave you the audacity to bring a letter to a military governor?’ I thought the letter was talking about a military government dissolving the state assembly. I didn’t know that he was a member of the state assembly. Being a very young military person then, I thought that was confrontation.

“So, I didn’t take kindly to it. The more he tried to stand his ground, I did what was the needful at the time. I said ‘go and lock this joker up.’ And they took him first to the military guardroom and then they moved him to Minna prison but after he came out from Minna prison for inexplicable reason, he showed up again and I thought this guy simply didn’t understand what was happening. I didn’t let him finish his sentence; I said ‘go and lock the joker up’ and they locked him up but I didn’t order his release.

“Somehow, he found his way back. This happened about the third time. He then started moving with a small baggage. Any time he ran into the governor, he would be locked up. We became friends from there onwards before I left Niger State. I found that he was simply a young energetic, patriotic Nigerian who meant well for this country and who was a trade unionist and just doing what he was supposed to do. Me ordering him to be locked up was doing my simple military duty, but both of us had something in common – the love for this country. He showed it then and he showed it until his last day on earth. The Kuta I knew was a prince. I don’t know how many of you know that but he had never addressed himself as a prince. He always said he was a comrade.

“Princes will print cards and put in bracket, high prince, double prince. That was such a gentle man that we had in Kuta,” Mark said.

While eulogising the late human rights activist, Mark described Kuta as a humble, frank and very patriotic Nigerian who initiated Hydro Power Producing Area Development Commission (HYPADEC) Bill in the sixth Senate and did not allow “me a moment of rest until that bill was passed and even after the bill was passed, he still followed it up.”

Furthermore, he said the deceased worked hard as a senator and was courageous, committed, honest, sincere and patriotic.  Earlier, Senate Leader, Victor Ndoma-Egba, had moved a motion supported by 107 senators, where he noted that Kuta, an alumnus of Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, was a member of Niger State House of Assembly in the Second Republic and later a member of the House of Representatives in the Third Republic.

Ndoma-Egba’s motion was followed by torrents of encomiums from senators who described Kuta as a peaceful, punctual, humble, friendly, humorous and patriotic Nigerians who related with all without prejudice to their religious and tribal affiliations.

The Senate therefore observed a minute silence in his honour and also resolved that HYPADEC House in Minna, the Niger State capital, be named after Kuta with a view to immortalising him as the initiator of the bill which gave birth to the commission.

Meanwhile, Governor Aliyu, yesterday denied strong insinuations preceding the death of the Kuta that he and the late senator had had a running battle over his perceived intention to unseat the latter in the Senate in 2015.

Aliyu, who made this denial while answering questions from journalists after the valedictory session held in honour of the late Kuta in the Senate yesterday, said those behind the insinuation were only out to play politics with his political career.
He said he had never made any declaration to contest for another election upon leaving office neither did he have any running battle with the late Kuta over his seat before his death.

Aliyu recalled how he didn’t have any intention to seek election into the House of Representatives before he was called for it and how he wasn’t in the governorship race before fortune smiled on him.

“There was never a running battle with the late Kuta. When I went to the House of Representatives, l didn’t seek for it. When I also went for the governorship election, I did not also contest for it.

“People want to play politics with everything.  I had never declared to anybody that  I want to run for any office yet. Whatever you might have read in the papers is the attempt by some people to play politics but I had never had any problem with the late senator,” Aliyu said.