By Adesina Soyooye
Shehu Sani, a human rights activist, and former Senator, Kaduna Central, says the presence of a former Governor of Kaduna State, now in opposition Coalition, gives him goose pimples. He describes El-Rufai as a dirty political figure and one who has never been out of Government since 1999, and yet laments about the state of Nigeria. So,his question to El-Rufai: “What contribution have you made to take care of the things you complain about? As for the future of the Coalition, Shehu Sani, recently awarded a National Honour, Commander of the Order of the Niger, CON, by President Bola Tinubu, says “It is dead on arrival.”
Sani who spoke in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria said:
“Any country or government without opposition can easily slide into a dictatorship or one-party state.
“If everyone goes into one political party and there is nobody to challenge the government or hold the government to account, our government could be run aground.
“We need a coalition and we need a credible opposition; a credible opposition should not be a canopy of frustrated and angry people, whose interest is not the country or the people, but their own selfish interest.
“There are people in this coalition whose presence will give you goose pimples. Someone like former governor of Kaduna State, Nasiru El-Rufai.
“He is not a clean political figure that came out of the trenches; he is not someone who has never been in government.
“Nigeria just celebrated 26 years of democracy and El-Rufai was the Director-General of Bureau of Public Enterprises for four years, minister for four years, governor for eight years, and so why did he not achieve all those things he is saying now while in office?”
According to Sani: ” If one had been in office for almost 20 years and the person is in his mid-sixty’s, such a person should be thankful to God because millions of people wanted to get what such person was taking for granted.”
.
On the main arrow head of the Coalition, Atiku Abubakar Shehu said:
“Though former Vice-President Alhaji Atiku Abubakar has the constitutional right to contest, he should not contest the 2027 presidential election.
Atiku should allow a Southerner to contest and serve out the turn of the South. By doing that, Atiku would have the moral right to seek the support of the south in 2031.
“As someone who has been in the political realm more than many other politicians, he should know that there are consequences for contesting elections every other time and losing.
“Atiku should not allow himself to be seen as a face of failure. He should rather be a good mathematician and a good hunter who knows when it is right to contest elections.
“When you have someone from the North who spent eight years in office and a Southerner just spent four years in office, and you are in the opposition, you have to present someone from the South as your party’s candidate.
“You don’t build an opposition on the foundation of frustration and non-inclusion. All those things El-Rufai is saying about Tinubu is because he failed the ministerial test.
“If he was made a Minister today, he would have been one of the vociferous attackers of anyone who says anything against Tinubu.
“Now he has reached a point whereby his utterances lack decorum, no restraint, and you can see anger, frustration and even desperation on his face.
“He has moved away from pinpointing areas where the government is not doing well to personal attacks on Mr President, and when one has reached such a level, it is more of exhibition of anger than playing opposition roles.
“Atiku has a lot of good political credentials. For instance, when, as activists, we were in prison in the 90s, he was in touch with us.
“I happened to share the same prison at Kirikiri, Lagos with the late Shehu Musa Yar’Adua who was Atiku’s mentor and Uba Sani was the contact between us and the outside world at that time.
“The strategies being employed by the coalition cannot fetch those behind it any result.
“For instance, the Coalition ought to be looking at sectoral performances of the Government in order to win support from the masses; rather, they are attacking the government aimlessly.
“Unfortunately, El-Rufai, as a Governor in Kaduna, left with bad records.
“He treated the people from Southern Kaduna viciously, sacking thousands of teachers without paying them, sacking thousands of civil servants, disobeying court orders and arresting journalists and activists, and imprisoning them.
“El-Rufai left mountain of debts and series of uncompleted projects, among other infractions and yet, coming now to preach about good governance, sanity and peace.”
Discover more from The Source
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
