By Sule Shuaibu, SAN,
FCIPDM, FICEN, MCArb
Before May 2023, Kaduna had become a grim ledger of loss. Verified figures show that over 1,200 people were killed in banditry and related violence between 2022 and the first quarter of 2023 alone, including 1,052 deaths recorded in 2022 and 214 more between January and March 2023, just weeks before the change in government. In the same period, nearly 5,000 people were abducted, while 2021 alone accounted for about 1,192 deaths and over 3,000 kidnappings. These were not abstract statistics; they translated into shuttered schools, displaced farming communities, paralysed local economies and a deep erosion of public trust.
Like Nelson Mandela, Governor Uba Sani governs with an appreciation that authority draws strength from legitimacy. By lowering political and communal temperatures, reopening channels of engagement and reassuring diverse constituencies, his administration has helped create an atmosphere where disputes are increasingly managed through dialogue rather than disorder. This deliberate calming of the polity has been central to the relative stability Kaduna now enjoys.
When Governor Uba Sani assumed office in May 2023, the instinctive response available to government was force — louder threats, harsher postures and reactive governance. But he chose otherwise. He recognised that peace enforced without consent is fragile, and that security imposed without trust rarely endures. His administration therefore prioritised prevention over reaction and legitimacy over intimidation.
A preventive, people-centred security approach was adopted: sustained engagement with communities, early conflict detection, constant consultation with traditional and religious leaders, and close coordination with peace committees and security agencies. Rather than wait for crises to erupt, tensions were identified early and quietly defused. This approach rarely made headlines, but it produced results.
The outcome has been a marked reduction in communal violence and security disruptions across the state. Areas once associated with persistent tension have experienced relative calm, allowing daily life to resume. Schools previously closed due to insecurity have reopened. Children have returned to classrooms. Farmers have reclaimed farmlands abandoned for years. Markets have regained their rhythm.
In governance terms, peace has restored normalcy — and normalcy has restored confidence.
This achievement rests on integrity as much as strategy. In this sense, Uba Sani’s leadership recalls Julius Nyerere’s ethic of restraint — power exercised without arrogance, authority deployed with humility. By refusing to weaponise identity or inflame divisions, he has reduced the incentives for grievance-based mobilisation. Listening, consultation and respect for institutional processes have become tools of security management, not signs of weakness.
Equally significant is the statecraft underpinning these gains. Like Seretse Khama’s Botswana, Kaduna’s progress reflects a belief in institutions over impulses and systems over personalities. Security responses are coordinated and rule-based. Peacebuilding is treated as infrastructure — something to be built patiently, maintained consistently and protected from political theatrics.
As stability has taken root, development has followed naturally. Road construction is reconnecting communities once isolated by fear. Healthcare delivery has expanded its reach. Education reforms and skills programmes are gaining traction. Agriculture has benefited from safer access to land and markets. These advances are not accidental; they are the dividends of a security environment that allows planning instead of panic.
Importantly, the improved atmosphere has reshaped external perceptions of Kaduna State. In September 2025, the United Kingdom officially moved Kaduna from the “Red” to the “Amber” category in its travel advisory, following a review announced around September 10–11. This reclassification was a concrete acknowledgment by an independent international authority that security conditions in the state had measurably improved. For investors, development partners and the global community, it signalled renewed confidence in Kaduna’s safety profile.
At 55, Uba Sani represents a quietly disruptive idea in Nigerian governance: that authority does not need intimidation to be effective, and that security does not require repression to be sustainable. His leadership suggests that firmness and empathy are not opposites, but complements — and that legitimacy can achieve what brute force often cannot.
Criticism will persist, as it should in a democracy. But peace has a way of asserting itself. It allows children to learn without fear, farmers to work without escort, traders to invest with confidence and governments to plan beyond emergencies. It replaces uncertainty with routine and restores trust in public authority.
At 55, Governor Uba Sani stands as a leader consolidating peace — governing without fear, securing without force, and demonstrating that calm, legitimate leadership can still deliver stability in difficult times.
*Shu’aibu is the Commissioner, Ministry of Internal Security and Home Affairs, Kaduna State.
