IBRAHIM IDRIS – GOVERNOR OF KOGI STATE
Governor Ibrahim Idris of Kogi State was born in 1949 at Icheke town in Omala Local Government Area of his state. He started his Primary Education in 1954 at Holy Trinity Primary School, Onitsha, Anambra State. In 1962, he moved to Kano in the north where he enrolled at the United Native Authority Primary School in the city for the continuation of his primary education which he completed in 1963. He moved down to the south again, specifically to Buguma in Rivers State, where he enrolled for commercial training at King’s Commercial College, Buguma in 1964.
No sooner did he leave school than he launched into business in the sixties with the establishment of Ibro Trading Company which has expanded considerably with many subsidiaries such as Ibro Construction Co; Ibor Furniture Company, Minna; Golden Spot Hotel, Minna; Ibro Farms, Minna as well as Ibro Electronics & General Supplies.
In 1970, he moved to Sokoto in the north where he set up a large-scale furniture factory – Ibrahim Furniture Factory, the largest in Sokoto State. He also set up Ibro Hotel, which was the first 3-star hotel and the largest in the old Sokoto State.
Having achieved great success in business and not content with his achievements, he decided to further his education. He, therefore, sat for and passed the General Certificate of Education (GCE) Examination. Thereafter, he enrolled to read Law in the Distance Learning Programme of the University of Abuja and graduated in 2004.
While running his multiple businesses and pursuing his Law degree at the University of Abuja in 2003, he also launched out into politics by contesting the governorship of his state on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) against the incumbent whom, against all odds, he defeated.
His governance focus has spanned various sectors of the state’s economy such as agriculture which has benefitted from the distribution of 227 tractors, 1,250 tricycles, free seeds and seedlings, and various loans to peasant farmers all with a view to making the state the largest producer of cassava and rice in the country. Some hundreds of housing units have also been erected under the owner-occupier scheme. Several blocks of school buildings have been built while in the health sector, 18 cottage hospitals have been built around the state while a first-rate Reference Hospital has been completed in Lokoja, the state capital. Again in 2007, he contested for his second term as governor and won.
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