North can’t retain power, punish Igbo forever, says Shehu Sani

Balarabe Musa laments PRP’s deregistration by INEC under Jega
The immediate past senator, who represented Kaduna Central in the Eighth National Assembly, Shehu Sani, has lampooned those suggesting the idea of the North holding on to power beyond 2023 after President Muhammadu Buhari’s term.

Sani, who said it would be ungrateful for the North to attempt retaining power in 2023, cautioned that southerners of Igbo extraction could not continue to be punished for the offence they were not architect of.

The senator, who was reacting to Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s recent call for abolition of power rotation, said it would be unfair for the North to hold grip of power in Nigeria and others being denied of such privilege after eight years of Buhari’s government.

Governor El-Rufai had last week described the zoning of political offices as a barrier to political equality.

Sani, who spoke yesterday when he paid a Sallah homage to the first Executive Governor of the old Kaduna State, Alhaji AbdulKadir Balarabe Musa, said categorically that southerners, particularly the South-West, did everything possible to support the northern candidate to emerge as the president in 2015, hence the need to relinquish power.

Meanwhile, Balarabe Musa, who later fielded questions from journalists, cautioned the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) over the arrival of erstwhile INEC Chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, to the party.

He said the party was deregistered under Jega’s leadership as INEC chairman.

Musa, who stated that INEC under Jega refused to recognise the party despite being reinstated by the court of law, however, said that it was a welcome development to receive the former INEC boss into the party as every Nigerian has right to association.

According to him, “Jega was Chairman of INEC and under his chairmanship, PRP was deregistered and it was a struggle for us. We went to the court, the court reinstated us and we still had problem of exercising our fundamental right in spite of court decision.

“Now, the same person who deregistered us is now coming back to PRP. We can’t reject him but we have to exercise care and caution.”