Prof. Maxwell Gidado: The Cerebral CoS Midwifing Fintiri’s Vision
Prof. Maxwell Gidado: The Cerebral CoS Midwifing Fintiri’s Vision
Who says Prof. Maxwell Michael Gidado and His Excellency, Rt. Hon. Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri, the Executive Governor of Adamawa State, has not come a long way in their friendship deeply steeped in unflinching loyalty, immaculate trust and sheer confidence?
These two illustrious Adamawa sons’ paths have always crossed. This will continue to be the case. They had previously collaborated. They are still collaborating. While one of them, specifically Fintiri, is the incumbent Governor of Adamawa, Prof. Gidado serves as His Excellency, Mr Governor’s Chief of Staff (CoS).
Their jobs have been cut out for them. However, Prof. Gidado, in particular, as one of the top government officials in the Fintiri administration, has even more to do, beyond his official duties as CoS.
It may not be explicitly spelt out, but he surely knows that actualizing the grand visions of His Excellency is a burden he, with only a few other high-ranking government officials, are saddled with, albeit not statutorily.
Apart from being an eminent scholar, Prof. Gidado is a seasoned administrator who has garnered international acclaim. The legal luminary and astute technocrat, who hails from Sugu town in Adamawa State’s Ganye Local Government Area, was re-appointed as Governor Fintiri’s Chief of Staff in 2019.
His emergence as CoS received overwhelming recognition across Nigeria. In 2014, Prof. Gidado had first served as Chief of Staff to Fintiri, who was then Acting Governor of Adamawa State, following the impeachment of Governor Murtala Nyako.
As the Chief of Staff to Governor Fintiri, Gidado, in the last three years, greatly helped the PDP-led state government (in several ways) to deliver on the electoral promises it made to the people of Adamawa, prior to 2019. He has meticulously and remarkably coordinated the activities of Mr Governor, especially the ones that were held at the Government House.
Another enduring legacy Prof Gidado will bequeath as CoS to His Excellency is the pragmatic and result-oriented policy initiatives he personally, not as the Chief of Staff, introduced to the State Government, which were all geared towards fast-tracking the socio-economic growth of Adamawa.
As a legal luminary and more important, as a prolific scholar, the Chief of Staff to Governor Fintiri, has properly guided the State Government on how best to avoid issues that may provoke legal actions against either the Governor or his government.
Tremendously endowed with traits of humility, selflessness, compassion, and also noble religious values, Prof. Gidado, works cordially with all shades of staff at the Adamawa Government House. Yet, he has never displayed bias on the account of religion, tribe or social status, to them. Talk of a detribalised and accessible leader, richly blessed with the quantum spirit of accommodation!
The Chief of Staff, has so far, deployed his wealth of experience in serving his beloved State, reason several vistas of opportunities were opened for Adamawa, and the good people of the State, in the three years of Fintiri’s administration.
The intelligent, articulate and self-effacing Gidado had a very humble beginning while growing up in his native Sugu town. He attended Ganye III Primary School from 1966 to 1969.
Aspiring to become a Catholic Priest, Prof. Gidado proceeded to St. Peters Seminary, in Yola. He was at the Seminary between 1973 to 1977 and thereafter came out in flying colours in the West African Examination Council School Certificate.
At the University of Maiduguri, where he first attended the School of Basic Studies and later gained admission to study Law, Gidado finished as the ‘Best Graduating Student’, in 1984. He was posted to Port Harcourt, Rivers State for his mandatory National Youth Service Corps Scheme – NYSC.
Prof. Gidado served at the private legal Chamber of Messrs A.O Arulogun and Co. Ikokwu, in Port Harcourt, between 1984 to 1985.
The Adamawa State-born don took up an appointment at the then Gongola State, now Adamawa State’s Ministry of Justice as State Council II in 1985.
But he will soon leave for the University of Maiduguri to become Assistant Lecturer in the Faculty of Law on October 1985.
With the hunger to relieve humanity of legal encumbrances, the cerebral Gidado went back to private legal practice at Messrs Dammo and Co, in Maiduguri. He, however, resumed his lecturing job in 1992, after graduating with a Doctorate Degree in Law, PhD, from the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom.
The vast Professor of Law has been a former member, of the Publication CommitteezUniversity of Maiduguri and Editor—In—Chief, Maiduguri Law journal. He is also a former Chairman of the Governing Board of College of Legal Studies, Yola Adamawa State; and leader of the Adamawa State Pilgrims’ delegation to the 1985 Christian Religious Pilgrimage in Jerusalem.
Prof. Gidado, a former member of the Senate of the University of Maiduguri, was the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice in Adamawa State from 1995 to 1997. He was also a Special Assistant to the Chairman, Constitutional Debate Coordinating Committee, from 11th November to 31st December 1998.
Equally, Maxwell Gidado, is a former Assistant Director (Academic) at the Nigeria Council of advance Legal education popularly known as Nigeria Law School, Bwari, Abuja; and again, a former Secretary, Presidential Committee on Review of the 1999 constitution.
His Supreme Court of Nigeria legal briefs and Court appearances included the much-celebrated Cameroon Vs Nigeria International Court of Justice—ICJ in 2002. Others included the Attorney general of the Federation Vs Attorney general of Abia state and others in 2001 see FWLR 202-420P.64.
Prof. Gidado has written many books among which are “Petroleum Development Contracts with Multinational Oil Firms: The Nigerian Experience” 273 pages and published in 1999; and “Introduction To Legal Methods” 213 pages and “Amending the Nigerian Constitution: Matters Arising” 240 pages.
The Adamawa Government’s Chief of Staff is at home with the traditional institution, where from his hometown he has been honoured with the chieftaincy title of Garkuwan Sugu. In faraway Abia State, he is “Nwanne Di na-mba 1 of Iheala Isulu Autonomous Community.
Another traditional title bestowed to Prof. Gidado is the ‘Ikemba 1’ of Ifite Ogwari, in Anambra State. He holds the National Honour of Officer of the Order of the Federal Republic of Equatorial Guinea.
Gidado, a former Senior Special Assistant (Legal and Constitutional Matters) to the President during the civilian administration of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, is married to Dr Rose Maxwell Gidado, an Assistant Director in the Agricultural Biotechnology Department of National Biotechnology Development Agency (NABDA), and their union is blessed with children.
