Alhaji (Dr.) Sule Lamido was born on August 30, 1948, at Bamaina Village in Birnin Kudu Local Government Area of Jigawa State. He began his educational career at Birnin Kudu Primary School in 1955. He got admission into Barewa College, Zaria in 1962, inspite of the antagonistic stand against western education in the north at that time.
On account of the recruitment drive persuasion prior to his exit from Barewa College, Sule Lamido opted to train as a railway engineer. But the practical side of the training that took place at the Permanent Way Training School, Zaria, proved unattractive to the budding engineer who opted out altogether, especially as the promise of travelling to and training as a real engineer in India no longer seemed forthcoming. Disenchanted with Railway Engineering and denied parental approval for a military career, Sule Lamido opted for the Nigeria Police. Although he got the chance, he missed it, having gone on to other things when the second signal calling them up came. The first signal to that effect halted their resumption at the Police College.Ikeja, as a result of the threat being issued by the Eastern Regional Governor, Colonel Emeka Ojukwu.
In 1969, Sule Lamido was at the Nigeria Tobacco Company, Zaria , first as Quality Control Officer in charge of ascertaining quality of mixing and packaging. Today, he is fond of saying that: “Throughout that one year, every cigarette manufactured in Zaria must have passed under my strict quality control supervision”. Later at NTC, Zaria, he became Zonal Salesman, first for the North West areas of Gusau, and Sokoto, before moving to take charge of the North East, covering present Taraba, Bauchi, Adamawa, Borno and Yobe States. Much later, he took over in present Benue and Plateau areas, thereby ending up with intimate knowledge of the entire Northern region of Nigeria. In 1972, Sule Lamido left the NTC for Christlieb as Northern Field Manager and later Brand Manager (Provisions). As the Brand Manager, Sule Lamido made all the company’s imports as well as opened new offices of the company which sold Thermos flasks, Quaker products, Heinz products, Cornflakes; Peppermint, Vaseline and Phensic (on behalf of Beecham). He had, in this position, the privilege of going to all the island local government areas of Rivers and Cross River States through Itigidi, everywhere in present Delta and Edo States, so that today, he is one of the few politicians who can say he had been able to appreciate Nigeria ever before becoming a politician.
In 1987, Sule Lamido left Christlieb to establish his private business. He founded Bamaina Holding Company which is now Bamaina Company Limited, involved in textile, oil and gas.
In 1979, he became a federal legislator on the platform of the radical populist People’s Redemption Party, (PRP). In the House of Representatives, he was a member of the House Business, Accounts, Water Resources and Works Committees. When it was time to form parties under Babangida’s Transition Programme, Sule Lamido was among the social democrats who put together the People’s Solidarity Party, (PSP), one of the 13 political parties that were disbanded by the military regime in favour of two parties, the National Republican Convention, NRC, and the Social Democratic Party, (SDP), in 1989.Sule Lamido was elected the pioneer Chairman of the Party (SDP) for Kano State. With the creation of Jigawa out of the old Kano State, Lamido became again the (pioneer Chairman and later the governorship aspirant until the then military President, General Ibrahim Babangida, disqualified him along with seven others. In late 1992, Sule Lamido was elected the National Secretary of the Social Democratic Party, (SDP). He was thus a core actor in the victory of Chief M. K. O. Abiola in the 1993 presidential election, which was, however, annulled in contradictory junta power politics.
In 1994, after the two parties were disbanded when late General Abacha took over government, Sule Lamido became the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Nigerian Agricultural and Co-operative Bank, NACB, his first major political appointment in life. In 1995, he went into the National Constitutional Conference as an appointee of the Federal Military Government but the seeming romance between the politician and the military terminated too abruptly once the politician became a critic of self- succession, particularly as a member of the G-18, the opposition platform of the most notable Northern politicians, whose rejection of General Sani Abacha, destabilised the latter’s self-succession project. It culminated in his arrest and detention in early 1998 by the regime. When SuleLamido was released from detention in mid l998, he rejoined his political group which had, by now, moved into the national platform called the G-34. Subsequently, the group formed the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, under which he contested the governorship of Jigawa State but lost in very controversial circumstances.
In June 1999, Sule Lamido was nominated for ministerial appointment by President Olusegun Obasanjo and subsequently confirmed by the Senate. He emerged the Foreign Affairs Minister on June 30, 1999, when the ministers were sworn in. In late 2003, Lamido returned to his native Jigawa state after serving as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1999-2003. He went straight into opposition leadership against the ANPP Government the National political Conference. In late 2007, he clinched the gubernatorial candidacy of the People’s Democratic Party, (PDP) emerging the governor on May 29th, 2007. His regime has been defined, more or less by the introduction of a social security regime of a monthly stipend to the most physically challenged persons in the state. He thus becomes the first government in the entire history of Nigeria to formally and democratically operationalise a social security regime thereby demonstrating (1) that poverty can be seriously attacked and actually eradicated (2) that lack of resources is not the real reasons for governmental inability to attack poverty on a serious scale given that Jigawa is officially, the poorest state in the Federal Republic of Nigeria and (3) the strategic role of compassion as an element of power.
Lamido’s regime thereby re-opened the debate on the moral and ideological foundations of power in the social transformation of Nigeria and things may never be the same. Sule Lamido, the father of 11 children, is married to Hajiya Amina Lamido and Hajiya Maryam Lamido. Those in the know squealed that in the history of Jigawa State, Governor Sule Lamido has unarguably emerged the most outstanding governor of Jigawa State on account of the people’s oriented project executed by his administration.
