El-Rufai: “PDP Not An Option For Me, Never

By Adesina Soyooye

For those, especially, members of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, looking forward to a return of Nasir El-Rufai, the immediate past Governor of Kaduna State, to the Party, the thought has better be perished.

In recent times, El-Rufai has been going round, meeting with politicians across the Country, especially in the North, with the aim of engineering a solid coalition to deny President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress, APC, a second term in office.

He has, particularly, met a couple of times with Atiku Abubakar, Presidential Candidate of the PDP in the 2023 Election. He and Atiku, also, together paid a condolence visit to the family of late Ijaw Leader, Chief Edwin Clark. And, a couple of days ago, El- Rufai had, to the surprise of a number of Nigerians, reminded of Atiku’s contributions to the growth of the economic sector of Nigeria when he was Vice President to President Olusegun Obasanjo. El-Rufai  said Nigerians are not given enough credit to Atiku in that regard.

Since the President Bola Tinubu Government, El-Rufai has been given a space. He is not in the inner circle. Something strange to him. During the Governments of both Obasanjo and Muhammadu Buhari, he was in the “very inner” circle. But now, he is in the cold. He couldn’t even get clearance at the Senate for a Ministerial appointment he had been nominated to.

On Monday, in an interview with Arise Television, he blamed it on Tinubu who he said ordered his non-clearance after the President had asked him to prepare to take over the problematic Ministry of Power and deal with the electricity mafia.

He noted in the interview that the APC had left him, and hinted that he would consider another platform if there is no change in the APC to continue his “progressive politics.”

Many had thought he would go back to the PDP, his original political party, under which he was the very powerful Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT.

But El-Rufai says perish the thought. He told his interviewer, Charles Aniagolu, that on no condition would he go to the PDP. Never, he said. According to him, PDP is worse than it was when he decamped to the APC. His visit to politicians across political parties, he said, meant nothing. He said he is free to visit friends who are not of the Political  Party with him.

El-Rufai: “It should be clear that the fact that I am in the APC doesn’t mean that I cannot visit a friend of mine who is in the PDP or SDP. So, anytime I visit anyone that is not in APC, they say ‘oh, he’s thinking of leaving the party’.

“I don’t know where I will end up if the APC doesn’t come back to where we started. But one thing I can tell you for sure is that PDP is not a party I will go to, ever. I have thought about that. I’ve decided that long ago, and nothing has changed. In fact, if anything, PDP has gotten worse. Rule out PDP.”