By A.B. Mahmoud
Professor Jibrin Ibrahim is a person with a commanding presence. I do not mean this in a metaphorical sense, though such could be seen as legitimate. I refer rather to his boisterous presence, taking a potshot at practically everyone and everything with his acute sense of humour, wit and laughter, none of which takes away from his deep, reflective, intellect. There is truly no dull moment with him. He is entertaining, engaging, educative and enlightening. I never miss an opportunity to be in his company. Almost inevitably, I go away, either entertained, educated or enlightened, frequently all.
I first met Jibo, as we all fondly call him, sometime in 1977 or 1978. We were both then students at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria. I joined the University then as a freshman in 1976 at the Kongo Campus where the law faculty was situated. This was after spending an extended academic year in the pre-degree program at the School of Basic Studies on the Main Campus of the University at Samaru. These were probably the best days to be at Ahmadu Bello University, neigh, any Nigerian University. It was a great citadel of learning. ABU was a diverse institution, with a rich international faculty. Scholars came from all around the world. A truly vibrant learning and teaching environment. My first real ‘university experience’ was when as a new student, I stepped into the University Library, the Kashim Ibrahim Library (KIL), then at its old site in the centre of the academic buildings and the University Administrative building was an awe-inspiring edifice. I recall how overwhelmed I was the first time I stepped into the building in 1976. The array of books, journals, periodicals and reference materials was simply stunning. My love for KIL continued when it moved to the massive new multistory complex. My favourite section of the library was the new arrivals section into which at the time, every publication from across the world could be found within a matter of days. I would plan to spend about 30 minutes exploring the new arrivals section whenever I visited the library. Often, I ended up spending the whole day. The Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, situate not far from the KIL old building was beehive of academic activities. Practically every week seminars, conferences and workshops abound. The intellectual environment had such towering radical scholars like Patrick Wilmot, Yusuf Bala Usman, Bjorn Beckman, Mahmud Tukur and the not so radical, like Ibrahim Tahir. At the Law Faculty, we also had our share of radical scholars like Kwame Opoku, Kharsion Chukol and many others. Though I was studying law at Kongo, I was regularly at the main campus for one activity or the other and it was in this milieu that I built a relationship and lifelong friendship with the likes of Jibo, Nntiem Kungai, Abdulraufu Mustapha, Yahaya Hashim, Asma’u Joda, Abubakar Wai, Husseini Abdulrahman and several others who were in the student movements at the time. The Movement for a Progressive Nigeria (MPN) was the main radical left leaning student movement in the two campuses of Ahmadu Bello University. It was under the umbrella of this movement, and the rich intellectual tradition of that era during which we dreamt and fantasized about a great future Nigeria that our friendships were incubated.
Jibo and Raufu enjoyed a close friendship. They were both students at the political science department. They were recruited as graduate assistants on graduation and shared the same apartment in Samaru which I frequented. They were later to proceed for their postgraduate studies, Raufu to University of Oxford in the UK and Jibo to “Etudes Africaines”, Istitut d’Etudes Politiques, Bourdeaux, France. Our friendship and activism continued even when they both returned to Ahmadu Bello University Zaria to teach with their spouses joining them shortly afterwards. Naturally, we all quickly cemented into one large family.
Prof Jibrin Ibrahim is well known to many for his high academic achievements and publications both locally and internationally. As an academic he is well published and frequently cited. As a consultant for numerous development agencies and governments both in Nigeria, across West Africa, whether the World Bank, UNDP or ECOWAS he has contributed immensely to understanding of various development challenges whether it is around security, conflict, religious studies, electoral democracy or governance. His work with the Uwais Commission on Electoral Reforms remains well known and acknowledged. His regular column in the Daily Trust Newspapers has become a popular read amongst ordinary Nigerians and policymakers. I am sure there are many persons that can speak better to these immense contributions as an academic or public intellectual. Nonetheless, over the course of the last several decades, I have shared close work and other related experience with Jibo which perhaps could enrich our understanding of his immense contributions to Nigeria and his community.
I begin from the early 1980s. I believe it was during his studies as a postgraduate student at ABU that a major international women’s conference was held at the Samaru Campus of the University in early 1982, championed by women academics and activists like Ayesha Imam, Bene Madunagu, Bilkisu Yusuf, Renee Pittin and a host of others. It was this international conference on women’s rights in Nigeria that led to the formation of ‘Women In Nigeria’ which quickly became the most prominent women’s rights group in the country. It was under the umbrella of this organization that several women (and male) leaders were to be groomed and mentored across Nigeria. From its inception, men who shared the vision and ideals of the organization of promoting women’s rights, equality and justice rooted in the broader context of human rights for all, formed part and parcel of ‘Women in Nigeria’. Jibo, Abudlraufu Mustapha, Yahaya Hashim, Husseni Abdulrahman, many others and I formed part of the initial founders and were joined by some of our spouses, Pat Mahmoud, Charmaine Pereira and Kate Meagher. Our friendship and ties continued to blossom over the years joined in shared vision and aspirations for a greater, just and equitable Nigeria.
Tapping into Jibo’s sharp intellectual mind and deep understanding of the Nigerian political economy has characterized our relationship in the last four and a half decades that I have known him. This has happened not only as a reader and follower of Jibo’s public intellectual engagements and contribution to national discourses, but I have in my own professional life often relied on Jibo to enrich my understanding of national and often international issues.
In 2016, I was elected President of the Nigerian Bar Association, a position I held for 2 years. Jibo including several colleagues and friends such as Prof. Attahiru Jega, Prof Abdulra’ufu Mustapha, Prof Chidi Odinkalu, Dr. Kole Shettima and many others helped in shaping some of the ideas that we tried to pursue especially around NBAs public interest engagements in conflict-areas of the Niger Delta, the North
East, North-Central and North-West Regions of the country. Jibo along with Prof Odinkalu were among the experts we engaged to assist us in interpreting and deciphering the dynamics of the conflicts in Southern Kaduna and other parts of the country. I was aware of Jibo’s work on conflict analysis of the ethno-religious drivers of conflict in Kaduna State, as well as his studies on the Boko Haram Conflict in the Northeast region of Nigeria. Thus, when we decided to embark on our study and advocacy tours to the conflict-ridden areas of Kaduna State, Jibo and Odinkalu were among the team of experts that we engaged and brought as part of the NBA team. Jibo brought his years of experience in conflict and religious studies to this assignment, and we found his contributions invaluable. He attended our meetings with lawyers from conflict areas. At the beginning of our engagement, it quickly dawned on us that our first task was to say to our members from Kaduna State that they were not combatants in those conflicts. Rather, they must view themselves as lawyers concerned about rights, rule of law and constitutional order. Their role in conflict situations involving their respective communities was not to line up behind the adversaries, rather, in line with the motto of our association, ‘Promoting the Rule of Law’, to assist in conflict resolution and protection of rights of victims. Both Jibo and Odinkalu, helped greatly in promoting these ideas. In our meetings with the Kaduna State Government officials, our town hall meetings in Kafanchan and various visits to affected communities in Southern Kaduna Jibo’s expertise in conflict studies helped shaped our engagement a great deal. We benefited from his resourcefulness, knowledge and understanding of the conflict dynamics and in shaping our recommendations for the short, medium to long term strategies for addressing the intractable conflicts in those communities.
A few months afterwards, Jibo along with Godwin Abu, a professor at Federal University of Agriculture Benue Stat,e were amongst the experts we engaged to accompany the Nigeria Bar Association Mission to Benue State. This was at the height of the farmers/herders’ conflict in the State and some of the controversial state government policies in the wake of the crisis. During our visit, we met with the State Governor and other top-ranking officials, and we visited the camps where displaced persons were sheltering. At the town hall meeting in Makurdi, Jibo in his characteristic manner, resorted to hyperbole in response to highly charged comments by one of the clerics at the meeting. Unfortunately, this did not go down well with the cleric and some members of the audience. I had to come to Jibo’s rescue to lower the tension in the hall. This must be one of the few occasions I had seen Jibo’s wit failed him. The atmosphere was so divisive that the Fulani herder community could not attend the meeting out of concern for their safety. We had to organize a separate hearing at the NBA National Secretariat in Abuja later to get their views and perspectives. Again, we had Jibo helping us in the analysis of the information gathered during the mission and our eventual report issued as well as the recommendations made to Governments and other stakeholders.
In February 2020, my firm decided to honour one of our founding partners, Alhaji Abubakar Boyi Dikko who had died a year earlier. After consulting with family and friends, it was agreed that we organised a national symposium around the theme ‘Farmers/ Herders Conflict’. The choice of the theme was informed partly by late Dikko’s passionate involvement with the farmers/herders’ conflict and the positive role he played in mediating disputes and conflicts involving Fulani herdsmen and farmers not only in Kebbi, his home state but indeed across Northern Nigeria through his various networks. Again, we had to fall on Jibo’s resourcefulness and networks to assist in assembling an array of scholars and researchers in the field who converged in Kebbi for a highly successful National Symposium under the distinguished Chairmanship of the then Vice President Prof. Yemi Osinbajo SAN. Whilst several other colleagues and friends such as Dr. Andrew Kwasari, who represented the Vice President, Prof M.T. Ladan, Amb Chive Ior Kaave, Dr. Ukoha Ukiwo, Prof Attahiru Jega, Prof Abubakar Saddique Mohammed, Dr. Kole Shettima, Amina Mohammed DSG United Nations, played important roles as speakers or resource persons, Jibo played a central role in moderating and directing the discussions and shaping the policy recommendations.
The Kano Emirate crisis erupted in 2019 which led to the dismemberment of the historic Kano Emirate and the dethronement of Emir Muhammadu Sanusi II. The Kano Emirate had existed as a single entity for more than 1000 years initially under the Habe rulers from ca. 999 AD and since the Fulani Jihad of 1804 under the Fulani dynasty. It served as a strong focal point of unity, cultural identity and social solidarity in Kano. Jibo and I shared a common perspective on the significance of the emirate system in Northern Nigeria. In our work in Zamfara State during my tenure as NBA President, we realized that though the problems were multifaceted, central to the issues was the collapse of the modern state system in much of Zamfara State. Justice administration had all but collapsed, courts and the police authorities have become largely associated with oppression and extortion and hardly administered justice. The traditional authorities which remained the last symbol of the state authority had also surrendered primarily to dual factors of the ineffectiveness of the state and local government administration whose sphere of influence was increasingly receding and to the audacity of the bandits that had moved in to replace the withering state. Vast swathe of territory in the Zamfara, Katsina and Sokoto had become ungoverned spaces following the collapse of state authorities and subsequently traditional authority system.
The emirates system, in our view, whether in Kano or elsewhere in Northern Nigeria, remained some kind of social compact between the modern Nigerian State that emerged since the colonial era and the traditional system of authority that remained relevant and material and has useful functions to perform in maintaining social order, cohesion and solidarity. Therefore, dismembering of the Emirate system was not only unnecessary, but could prove catastrophic as the Nigerian State continued to struggle to maintain its relevance in Northern Nigeria.
When the new administration emerged in Kano following the 2023 elections, some stakeholders took the view that the opportunity presented itself to advocate for a reversal of policies of the old administration, and to seek for the re-establishment of the old Kano Emirate as a single entity. The initial thinking was to approach the matter in the same clandestine manner adopted by the previous administration: orchestrate a private bill from some ‘unknown person’, mobilize the House of Assembly to speedily pass it and obtain the assent of the Governor swiftly overnight. Some of us opposed this strategy, instead advocating for an open consultative approach. The new administration should be persuaded to adopt a policy to restore the Emirate system to its previous standing. If it accepted and adopted that policy, then it should present an executive bill to repeal and reestablish the legal order as it had previously existed. Prof Tijjani Naniya, Mal Ado Kurawa and a few others were amongst those consulted to craft an appropriate policy document to present to the administration the social, historical and politico-cultural justification for such a policy direction. Jibo was another scholar I recommended to assist in the policy formulation even as I and other colleagues focused on the legal approach and strategy. Jibo’s contribution to the framing of the policy document was critical. He complimented the immense historical knowledge and understanding that was brought by other scholars like Prof. Tijjani Naniya and Mallam Ado Kurawa and many others who may not like to be mentioned at this point. As formulated in the policy document:
“The recognition of the Emirate remains a pivotal social contract of some sort by which the modern Nigerian State has recognised the continuing relevance of the traditional system of authority which has continued to serve as an enduring fulcrum of unity, identity and social cohesion often mobilised not just for its pomp and pageantry but as a source of peace, order and stability”.
It was important, it was contended that the system, if it was to remain relevant must be preserved as recognized and accepted by the community. Any interference or disruption would only undermine its legitimacy and acceptability.
Prof. Jibrin Ibrahim may be resident in Abuja and engaged with his frequent travels across Africa and rest of the world, yet he remained deeply rooted and engaged in the affairs of not just Nigeria but of Kano where he hails from. On more than one occasion, both of us were involved in voluntary election observations duties in Kano touring the nooks and crannies of the State and Kano metropolis to observe the conduct of elections. During one such mission in 2019, covering the Gubernatorial elections, we had to quickly withdraw after encountering what could have been life threatening situations. The incident ironically, occurred not far from the Mumbayya House, the residence of Mallam Aminu Kano which had been turned into the Centre for Research and Democratic Studies. We had gone to Gwammaja to one of the polling centres. As we drove out, we ran into a formidable police patrol team which comprised fierce looking personnel and heavily armed that had apparently been sent from Abuja on what the locals assumed was part of a grand Abuja plot to manipulate the election. The crowd became hostile. The situation quickly deteriorated, and we were caught in between the crowd and the police with tear gas and what we believe were live ammunition being fired into the air. We managed to escape the scene but insisted on continuing our mission deeper into Dala quarters of the municipality. A few meters down the road as we headed to the foot of Dala Hills which housed several polling centres, we met a group of young people. We tried to engage them to get a sense of what was happening. Their advice was very clear and stern. “Do not go forward”. The danger was obvious. The crowd was unlikely to be able to differentiate between lawful observer missions and state officials thought to be trying to manipulate the election. We withdrew from Dala and headed towards Brigade Quarters; a densely populated suburb of the city that had in that election become somewhat of a battleground. As we approached the area, we were in no doubt that it was not safe to proceed. Too many young men armed with cudgels and other offensive weapons ready to defend their votes and fight off any perceived threats as intruders. At that point, we thought it was better safe than pursuing our observation mission. We retired to my house to watch the proceedings on national television. The narrative out there was in stark contrast with the reality we witnessed on ground. The outcome of that election is now history.
Let me mention perhaps the two recent community engagements in Kano, in respect of which Jibo played a very critical role. First was an initiative called “Kano Against Covid-19”. This was a community initiative that was birthed in the wake of the Covid pandemic that broke out late 2019 and early 2020. Many of us were deeply concerned about what appeared to be a catastrophic scenario that was unfolding. The lack of preparedness of both the Federal and State authorities was palpable. We thought it was imperative that as private citizens we mobilized to support the efforts of both the State and Federal Governments as well as the local authorities. The response was incredibly impressive. In just a short while many professionals (medical, legal, media, academics etc), smart and innovative young people quickly came together to mobilise resources and embark on advocacy and various interventions both at policy level and in terms of distribution of medical materials, food and other palliatives. Within a few weeks we were able to mobilize a huge number of resources as well as hold several enlightenment activities in conjunction with the State Council of Ulama. We established a remote virtual consultation centre, both at the State owned Nassarawa Hospital and Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital which enabled virtual consultations by physicians and other health workers. We convened virtual meetings at which officials of the State Government, including the State Governor, and top-ranking health officials at federal and state levels participated. These meetings helped to shape both the federal and state governments response to the pandemic.
The initiative involved many prominent Citizens. The steering committee included Late Alhaji Bashir Tofa, Prof Yadudu, Prof Jega, Maryam Uwais, Aisha Oyebode, Mal. Bala Mohammed, Prof Mohammed Tabiu, Mrs Fatima Abudulrahman, Prof Mahmoud Umar Sani of Bayero University, YZ Ya’u, Amal Hassan, Dr. Kole Shetimma, and me. Jibo was not only a member of that committee but jointly co-chaired the Committee providing leadership, guidance and directing its activities.
During the pandemic, we lost a prominent member of the steering committee and a trustee of the organization, Alhaji Bashir Othman Tofa. Given Alhaji Bashir’s towering influence and his sterling qualities as a leader, Kano Against Covid-19 jointly with the organization he led until his demise, the Kano Concerned Citizen’s Initiative (KCCI) (now under the leadership of Alhaji Shehu Mohammed, Sarkin Shanun Kano) decided to honour Alhaji Bashir. Since his death, two hugely successful memorial events have been organized and Prof. Jibrin Ibrahim played a prominent role in both, giving insight into some of Alhaji Bashir’s involvement in peace and conflict resolution efforts across the North many of which were unknown and only came to light following some of the revelations by Prof. Jibrin Ibrahim.
My involvement with Jibo and understanding of his person is not only in the context of the kind of activities I set out in this tribute. Jibo and his wife Charmaine have become so connected with us that we consider them literally part of our extended family. They have been around us and supportive through many ups and downs. Jibo and Charmaine’s generosity and hospitality are all too well known. Their home whether it was during their brief sojourn in Kano, or in Zaria or after moving to Abuja has always been open to us. Although I am no fan of some his favourite pass times, like fish and Isewu joints, he at least shares his love for Isewu with my wife. We have also other aspirations which we share but have pursued probably to varying extents and with different levels of success. I am referring to our aspirations for fitness. I recall the few times we took to walking and jogging back in the days in Zaria. We never made much headway. But Jibo many years later took interest in swimming which I think he has still maintained. I have to confirm with Charmaine how frequently he goes out swimming though!
On behalf of my wife, myself and our children, all of whom are extremely fond of Jibo, I wish you a happy 70th birthday. Your life has been a source of inspiration for us. Our friendship has been a source of joy. Do not underrate how deeply impactful you have been on us.
More importantly, few intellectuals of your generation have been so involved in so many facets of our community and national life and have made such an impact as you have!! We wish you a happy birthday and many more years ahead in good health and prosperity.
May your dreams of a greater, united, prosperous, and equitable Nigeria, founded on the rule of law and justice to all come true in your lifetime.
Abubakar Balarabe Mahmoud, SAN, OON
Dated in Kano
November 21, 2024
