I first came to Gombe town in the mid 70’s. Then it was the headquarters of one of the Local Governments of Bauchi state. For somebody who was coming into town for the first time, I was naturally scared of how to find my way to my senior brother who was resident there, a salesman for Michelin tires.
“It is a one street town. Just come you will not get lost.” That was all the assurance I needed to leave Ibadan where I was a student to start the adventure to visit a town I had never seen for my holidays.
I left Ibadan in the morning and got to Jos rather late so I spent the night there. On the instructions of my brother if I got to Gombe before 8am I should just go to Gombe Post Office and I was sure to meet him there. Alternatively, if I got to the town in the afternoon, I should proceed to the same Post Office by 2.00pm and he will be there. His office routine made it mandatory to be at the Post Office at 8am and 2pm everyday.
I took a taxi to Bauchi from Jos the following morning. Everything went on fine. In Bauchi, I started having fears of my safety. In the taxi park, I boarded a taxi, a brand new Peugeot and paid. Very soon, the taxi was full and we the passengers took our seats and were ready for the take-off. Then a young boy whose age I estimated to be sixteen took the driver’s seat. I thought he was an apprentice driver who was going to move the car out of the park and hand it over to a more matured man. But once outside the park he just fired the car on and hit the highway. I wondered not silently if the under-aged boy was our driver to Gombe.
Everybody in the car except a young Ibo man expressed surprise at my question. I said yes explaining that he was too young to be a commercial taxi driver. They just ignored me and the journey continued. Then the young Ibo man also complained about the speed of the taxi. The boy was driving at maximum speed with the speedometer clearing indicating that he was hitting the maximum speed marked by the manufacturers of the car. The Ibo man kept complaining until the passengers contributed money and returned the fare he paid. He was then forced to drop in the middle of the bush while we continued our journey. I was left alone between the devil and the deep blue sea. If I continued with the complaints about the suicidal speed, I stood the risk of immediate discharge from the vehicle and risk missing my brother at our 2.00pm scheduled meeting. I decided to keep quiet.
Thank God we got to Gombe safely and when I met my brother, the first thing I told him was the speed of a young driver from Bauchi to Gombe. I had noticed a big inscription on each side of the car – “Follow me”. He just laughed and told me that anybody driving on that road regularly knew the boy and his excessive speeding.
On my second visit to Gombe some months later, I did not see “Follow me” at the Bauchi motor park. I had made up my mind not to follow the dare devil driver even if he was the only taxi available. I told my brother of my decision. When I followed another taxi to Gombe, I told my brother that I did not see the speedmaster. “You cannot see him because he is dead.” A few months after I left Gombe after my first visit, the boy had a terrible accident, my brother told me. The car was reduced to bits and pieces and so were all the human beings inside the car.
My first visit to Gombe was however very pleasant. It was a one street town really. Very few inhabitants, fewer civil servants and even fewer workers in the private sector like my senior brother. There was the Gombe Club where we used to hang out almost every evening and the Gombe government guest house for visitors in town. It was a quiet, peaceful life.
Today Gombe is no longer a Local Government headquarters. Since October 1 1996, it became a full blown State carved out of Bauchi by General Sani Abacha. I have watched with keen interests the developments in Gombe which rejoices in the slogan ‘Jewel in the Savannah.’ There could not have been a better description for the town which has developed from the small rusty town I first saw in the mid 70’s into a modern beautiful town. In fact apart from Calabar, there is no state capital in Nigeria as clean, well planned and beautiful as Gombe.
In 1996 Abacha did not only create Gombe. He created Ebonyi, Bayelsa, Nasarawa, Zamfara and Ekiti. Of these states a visit to Gombe will convince you that the people of the state and their leaders have taken very great advantage of the chance given them by Abacha. The state stands out clearly as the leader in terms of development among the states that were created that year. Sadly, some states created even in the 70’s are clearly lagging behind Gombe.
On a visit to Gombe last week, I sought to know from some opinion leaders what has made Gombe such a progressive state. They all agreed that the state has been blessed with high quality hard working governors since the country returned to democracy in 1999. Beginning with Abubakar Hashidu in 1999, Mohammed Danjuma Goje in 2003 Ibrahim Dakwambo 2011 and the present Muhammed Inuwa Yahaya in 2019, it has been a case of one state governor doing his best to out-perform the other. If there is any political acrimony at all in Gombe, the leaders have not allowed it to affect development or even peaceful coexistence of the citizens as it is common among the states of North East.
Given the way politics has blocked instead of brought development in many states, Gombe comes as something of a surprise.
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