Governor’s aide attacks NNPP federal lawmakers

An aide of Governor Abba Yusuf of Kano State has accused federal lawmakers from the state elected under their New Nigerian People’s Party (NNPP) of indifference to the emirate crisis rocking the state.

SalisuSalisu Hotoro, the social media aide to the governor, said in a viral Facebook post on Wednesday that the lawmakers have abandoned the fight to the governor and their political godfather, Rabiu Kwankwaso.

Governor Yusuf reinstated Lamido Sanusi as the Emir of Kano on 24 May after signing an amendment to the emirate law 2019. The amendment scrapped the four emirates created under the 2019 law and led to the deposition of Aminu Ado-Bayero as the Emir of Kano.

Mr Ado-Bayero is challenging his removal in court and has occupied the mini palace of the emir in defiance of directives by the state government.

Mr Hotoro said the senators representing Kano South, Kawu Sumaila, his colleague representing the central district, Sani Hanga, and the NNPP members in the House of Representatives from the state have not been protecting the interests of the state government on the issue at the National Assembly.

He said the lawmakers should have raised the emirate crisis at the National Assembly to call the federal government to order, but have behaved as if the fight was only for the governor.

Mr Hotoro’s post came on the heels of a debate in the state on why only two federal lawmakers from the constituencies in the Kano metropolis have so far visited the reinstated emir, Lamido Sanusi. The others, whose districts fall under the scrapped emirates, have stayed away, allegedly not to be in the bad books of their constituents.

“This is clearly the habit of ‘I have gotten what I want, and I don’t care about what will happen to others,’” Mr Hotoro said about the lawmakers.

In 2016 when then-senator Rabiu Kwankwaso could not enter Kano due to a rift with then Governor Abdullahi Ganduje, senators Barau Jibrin and Kabiru Gaya defended Mr Ganduje’s action and convinced the then-senate president, Bukola Saraki, to align with them even though he was against their stand.

“It’s disheartening to see that we (NNPP members) are in a critical condition in dire need of their (the lawmakers) voices at their respective chambers to caution the present police authorities not to be partisan in the crisis and do the needful, but our lawmakers thought that the fight is not theirs,” Mr Hotoro said.

He said if the governor failed in his struggle, the lawmakers, too, would have failed.

Also, he lamented that while Lagos lawyers Femi Falana and Ladipo Johnson were loud in voicing support for the governor, the Kano lawmakers had remained silent.

In the latest development in the tussle for the emir’s stool, the Federal High Court voided Mr Sanusi’s reappointment on Thursday and ordered the state government to halt the implementation of the Kano Emirate Council (Repeal) Law, 2024.

The judge, Abdullahi Liman, ruled that the reappointment of Mr Sanusi was null and void because the government disobeyed the court’s earlier order restraining it from taking further action on the new emirate council law of the state.