2027: Taraba indigenes list 42 unfulfilled promises against Gov Kefas

By Omeiza Ajayi

ABUJA: Stakeholders in Taraba state under the aegis of Concerned Taraba Citizens have listed 42 unfulfilled campaign promises against Governor Agbu Kefas, insisting that the outstanding projects cannot be ignored as the governor seeks a second term in the 2027 governorship election.

The group’s Executive Director, Yakubu Haruna, in a statement, said the list cuts across some of the most critical needs of the state, spanning roads and transportation, education, healthcare, water, electricity, employment and workers’ welfare, and comes at a time the state’s revenue from the Federation Account Allocation Committee FAAC has risen sharply since Kefas assumed office in 2023.

According to him, the outstanding projects include the dualisation of the Jalingo-Wukari, Bali-Gembu and Zing-Wukari roads; construction of the Jalingo-Karim Lamido, Wukari-Chinkai, Donga-Bentaje-Tunari and Lafiya-Jen roads; the Wukari-Takum Junction flyover; township roads in Jalingo and Wukari; the Jalingo International Trailer Park; Jalingo International Market; the Wukari International Yam Market; metro buses for Jalingo; renovation of public schools; a Wukari Specialist Hospital; stadium projects in Wukari; improved water and electricity supply; youth employment; and the settlement of outstanding salary, pension and gratuity obligations.

The group noted that Kefas had, shortly after his victory in 2023, reinforced expectations of a different style of governance. Through his spokesman, the governor-elect had declared: “The era of promise and fail is over.”

Haruna argued that three years on, that declaration has become a political measuring stick, particularly because the financial environment in which Kefas has governed differs markedly from what his predecessor inherited.

“Taraba’s gross allocation from the Federation Account Allocation Committee stood at ₦64.91 billion in 2022, the year before Kefas took office. It rose to ₦94.23 billion in 2023 and then surged to ₦220.58 billion in 2024, a 134.09 percent increase in one year and more than three times the 2022 figure,” the statement read.

It added that the state’s total revenue rose from ₦115.06 billion in 2023 to ₦249.02 billion in 2024, according to BudgIT’s analysis of state fiscal data, with gross FAAC accounting for 93.21 per cent of the state’s recurrent revenue in 2024. The trend, the group said, continued into 2025 and 2026, with Taraba receiving ₦162.47 billion gross FAAC in 2025, of which ₦153.33 billion was net after deductions, and a further ₦94.37 billion gross, ₦90.83 billion net, in the first half of 2026 alone.

While acknowledging that not every naira of FAAC is available for new projects because of statutory obligations, deductions, debt servicing and recurrent expenditure, the group maintained that this does not remove the legitimate question of what Taraba has been able to achieve with the larger revenue flows available to the administration.

“If Taraba’s gross FAAC more than doubled between 2023 and 2024, while total revenue more than doubled in the same period, Tarabans are entitled to expect a corresponding acceleration in development.

“Workers are entitled to their salaries. Pensioners are entitled to their pensions. These are obligations of government, not political favours to be converted into campaign trophies,” the statement said, adding that the more important question is what government does after meeting those obligations, including how much it invests in infrastructure, how it stimulates productive sectors and how it creates jobs.

Concerned Taraba Citizens said the emergence of Senator Emmanuel Bwacha as the Peoples Democratic Party PDP candidate for 2027 has sharpened the contest, describing his mission statement as pointing to a different governing philosophy built around education, regular payment of salaries and pensions, support for farmers, more even development, action against insecurity, fairness across religious and ethnic lines, and a more open mining sector.

The group noted that Bwacha, who ran against Kefas in 2023 on the platform of the APC has since returned to the PDP, while Kefas has moved to the APC, adding an added layer to the political realignment ahead of the poll.

“Bwacha is not seeking to defend three years of government. He is seeking to convince voters that Taraba can do better. And after three years of the Kefas administration, with billions more flowing into the state coffers, that argument deserves to be heard,” the statement said.

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