Kaduna
senator, Shehu Sani, has urged the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, to
punish Gov. Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State for allegedly leaking to reporters a
memo he wrote to President Muhammadu Buhari.
Mr. Sani, who is the
Vice-Chairman, Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs, called for punitive
measures in a statement he released in Abuja on Saturday.
In the September 2016
memo published this week, Mr. El-Rufai told President Buhari that he was losing the vision and
the momentum with which APC started the change campaign.
The governor told the
president how bad the nation was faring under his watch, and how the
president’s policies, actions and in-actions have contributed to the nation’s
woes, and what could be done to steer Nigeria back to greatness.
In the 30-page memo,
first published by Sahara Reporters on Thursday, to Mr. Buhari touched several
areas, ranging from the ailing economy, to the dynamics of the nation’s
politics, lack of coercion within the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC,
and the poor relationship between the president and the national leader of the
APC, Bola Tinubu, and other party leaders, including the APC governors.
Mr. Sani said it was
ironic that while Gov. El-Rufai could not stand constructive criticism, he had
the audacity to criticise the president.
“The governor always
recommends that our party should punish me for criticising him,” the lawmaker
said.
“Now that he has fired
a cruise missile at the President through a deliberately leaked memo, he should
also be treated the same way.
“He
accused me of being disloyal and disrespectful to the President and the party
for speaking my mind.
“Now he has done his
own cunningly by criticising the President and the party, disguised it as a
memo and leaked it out to the press.
“If our able party
chair would give me five strokes of the cane for speaking out, the governor (El
Rufai) should be given thrice that for ‘leaking out’.
“It’s often said that
look at the message and not the messenger, but there are times when you can
only decipher the message by looking at the messenger,” he said.
According to Mr. Sani,
while Gov. El-Rufai is entitled to his opinion and perception, the
contradiction and irony is that he carried out an action he always stood
against when criticised.
-PT
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