Tribute to my Daddy: Malam Muhammad Inuwa Dutse in last trip to Malaysia, Allah knows I miss him- Son
By Abubakar Inuwa Dutse
June 09, 2020
There is a story behind the attached picture. It was snapped at the Malaysian High Commission when Malam went for Visa interview for the first and last time.
It was the first time that the officials of the Malaysian High Commission in over a decade of traveling to Malaysia every year, insisted that whoever was getting a visa must appear in person for the Visa interview. That was when I knew we were in for trouble, because convincing Malam to come to Abuja would be a herculean task. He always had one excuse or another in order to dodge traveling. One of such was that,there was no flight directly from Kano. This was prior to the commencement of Turkish and Emirates Airlines flight operations in Kano. Another excuse was that, he could not travel for weeks and leave behind his farming occupational. So the yearly ritual of traveling to Malaysia had always been met with resistance and a lot of convincing before he could agree to the trip. As if those were not enough, there is now this new regulation by the High Commission. As was expected, he said he wasn’t traveling to Abuja for any interview. I recruited my brothers to plead with him and convince him to agree to come, but he refused to budge.
My mum sisters, Fati and Aisha and my cousin, Ikram Omar who were also travelling had no option but to leave for Abuja without him a day prior to the interview. However, on the day of the interview, Aliyu, my brother, called to inform me that I should go to the airport and pick Malam who had finally agreed to come. I rushed to the Airport to pick him up. Upon meeting him, I said “Malam ka yarda ka sauko kenan”?, meaning you have finally agreed to come. He replied, “Dama ban hau da nisa ba”, meaning yes.
The annoying thing was that at the beginning when I went to pick up the forms for the visa and was informed of the new policy, the officials made it look like there was going to be a formal visa interview. These were Nigerians, more like clerks, not any Malaysian. I pleaded with them to consider that my father was 2 years shy at 90 and the fact that he travelled to Malaysia every year without fail for over a decade, but all that fell on deaf ears. However to my consternation and annoyance, there wasn’t any interview, they only sighted the applicants and asked me to report back in a week to pick our visas.
Fast forward to 3 weeks. There we were in Kuala Lumpur, enroute the Island of Penang. We flew for 5 hours from Kano to Instanbul, then another 11 hours non-stop to Kuala Lumpur. While having breakfast at the hotel a day after our arrival, I reminded Malam of the flight time (11 hours) from Istanbul to Kuala Lumpur, adding that if not for the whiteman, there was no way that we could have ever come to Malaysia. His response was that a blackman cannot hang even hang on a tree for 11 hours without falling off. This really cracked me up.
There were actually signs exhibited by Malam during the trip which were indications that he had lost the strength and agility he usually exhibited during such trips. He also had throughout his life a healthy appetite and could eat anything edible. He used to say that he didn’t know the difference between food that is nice and one that is not. While there,we noticed that whenever we went out to eat, he barely touched the food. We kept making suggestions to him of different types of food( Malaysians have a rich food culture), but he just wasn’t interested. Another thing I observed was that he was not interested in going anywhere. This was a man that would lead us on visits to farms, plant nurseries, high and wielding mountains, wildlife parks, tea plantations and factories, zoos, botanical gardens, flower gardens, birds sanctuaries, tourist sites and locations like Langkawi Island. However, at this particular trip, the moment we went out for an hour or two, he would request that we go back to our accommodation. The surprising thing was that he enjoyed an active and healthy life without any health challenge. So while there, as was the normal practice, we all had a thorough medical check and his as usual came out clean.
Nonetheless, witnessing the setbacks, we had already concluded that it was his last journey to Malaysia. His strength had left him.
The journey took place in September, by November he had started facing health challenges which defied diagnosis and solution.
Malam was one man that farming defined his life. His passion for it was second to none. He would often go to his farmhouse which is situated about 80 kilometers away from Kano and spend over a week there. It was while he was there that one particular day, we were informed around 11p.m, that he was not feeling well. We were worried that he might not agree to follow us back to Kano in order to be taken to the hospital. We carried a nephew of ours who was a grandchild to him and who could force him to follow us (it’s always a battle to convince him to go to a hospital), unlike we, his children. Getting to the farm around 12 noon we found him in pains. We told him that we had come to pick him in order to take him to an hospital back in Kano. The fact that he didn’t resist made us realize how serious his condition was.
I remember the last time I had legible discussion with him was in his bedroom when he had already become bedridden. I went to bid him farewell as I was returning to Abuja, he kept asking me to get on my way so that I could arrive Abuja before it gets late. By the time I came back after a fortnight, he was already on admission and his health had further deteriorated. His last days were spent in Hospital while efforts were being made to fly him to Jeddah for further medical evaluation. He breathed his last breath around 10:00a.m on December 24, 2017.
Allah knows I miss Malam.
Rabbigfirhum warhamhum wa dakalahu fil jannatul a’ala.
Malam Muhammad Inuwa Dutse, who was a former Commissioner of Agriculture in Kano State during the first military administration in Nigeria died
at the age of 88 during a brief illness.
Dutse played active and remarkable role in laying the foundation of Kano State agricultural development.
The late Dutse was a consummate and dedicated public servant who served his people selflessly and was one of the finest civil servants of his generation.
President Buhari had described Dutse’s passion for agriculture as worthy of emulation, recalling that until his death,the deceased was an active farmer, in spite of his advanced age.
