Makurdi and Aliyu Machika
6 October 2008
Abuja — Former Zamfara State governor Senator Ahmed Sani, Yeriman Bakura single handedly dragged the opposition All Nigeria Peoples Party [ANPP] into President Umaru Yar'Adua's Government of National Unity (GNU), the party's presidential candidate in last year's elections General Muhammadu Buhari said in Makurdi at the weekend.
Buhari also said there can be no development if voters fold their arms and watch, instead of insisting that their votes count after elections.
Speaking to newsmen at the Presidential Lodge of Government House in Makurdi, Benue State, Buhari said the GNU was completely illegal and did not follow due process. He said the arrangement is not in any way geared towards the good of the ANPP.
He said Senator Yerima flouted the three critical aspects required for any agreements between political parties and instead went ahead in signing on behalf of the ANPP for his personal interest.
"The necessary steps were not taken before the former governor of Zamfara State went ahead to sign the agreement for a GNU. Therefore, the GNU is illegal", Buhari said. He said the most ideal process would have been for the caucus of the party, its top echelon and the National Working Committee to meet before any major decision of that magnitude would be taken.
Buhari advised elected officials in government to live up to their respective campaign promises to enthrone accountability and transparency in governance. "Lets state here that most of those people are the ones now responsible for the misappropriation of billions of the country's economy in dollars, not even in naira, and are going out in jets in this country. That is the kind of government that we have today", he said.
Buhari was in the state to attend the wedding of the daughter of ANPP National Organizing Secretary, Architect David Umah in Gboko.
Meanwhile, a top aide to General Buhari has cautioned Supreme Court Justices to ensure fairness and equity in the discharge of their duties, even as he passionately appealed to the Apex court Justices to protect the integrity of the judiciary.
Buhari and his counterpart of the Action Congress (AC), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar have gone to the Apex Court challenging the victory of President Umaru Musa Yar'adua in the April 21, 2007 presidential poll.
The Secretary of his Presidential Campaign Committee, Engineer Buba Galadima, said in Abuja at the weekend that there is need for the eminent jurists to guard their integrity jealously against the intrusion of those he described as "charlatans, thieves and discredited persons" in Nigeria.
Galadima was reacting to a report by the controversial internet newsletter Sahara Reporters, which alleged that the Presidency had set up a high powered committee made up of some former state Governors, and charged them with the responsibility of getting a favorable judgment for President Yar'adua at the Supreme Court.
He said, "We came across that report and frankly speaking, that report is disturbing, not just to us as litigants, but it should be disturbing to every right thinking Nigerian that at the level of the Supreme Court, people can allow themselves to be influenced by any institution or anybody, any highly placed individual in Nigeria."
He added that "if the supreme court, as reported by Sahara Reporters, is being approached by charlatans, those that I consider as thieves in our society, those people who have been discredited and have been taken to court for embezzlement and the Justices who are supposed to be pious Justices of the Supreme Court can even sit down under the same shade to discuss issues, then this nation, we must pray fervently for securing its soul."
Galadima said he believed the piece of information contained in the Sahara Reporters news story because the same organization had accurately predicted the outcome of two previous election tribunal judgments.
"Anything that is coming from Sahara Reporters, to me, is credible because I have no cause to doubt their report because they have reported in the past and were proved right on many occasions. So I would have no reason to doubt this one", he said.
He further said that the speculation of Sahara Reporters in this regard was confirmed by Presidential spokesman Olusegun Adeniyi, who told State House correspondents last Thursday that Buhari was crying wolf because his case at the Supreme Court is weak.
He therefore advised the Supreme Court Justices to do everything to protect their image. "It is my candid advice to the esteemed Justices of the Supreme Court, that they should never allow their image to be soiled.
They are in the last lap of a relay race to the here beyond", he said.
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Is this not the same Yerima that introduced Sharia Laws in his home state designed to stone to death adulterers or amputate the arms of common thieves? The same Yerima that stole billions of Naira yet ended up as a Senator with his arms still intact. If Yerima is the kinds of operative that King Tarry-A-Doer listens to and relies on to recruit "pickpockets" and "armed-robbers" to GNU then both the PDP and the ANPP are not credible partners but pretenders. Buhari shouldn't worry - we already know how the Supreme Court will rule, we just want to see… [Read Full Text]