•Says there’s anger in north, nobody from the region will vote the president today
•Wants so-called security report on him released
•Hints he might leave APC, insists party has left him
•Pledges never to defect to PDP, but any other party remains an option
•Gov Sani Uba, Nuhu Ribadu no longer my friends, ex-minister affirms
•Alleges Ribadu trying to eliminate all opposition to his 2031 presidential ambition
•Ribadu responds: I have never discussed running for president in 2031, my focus is on Nigeria and President Tinubu
•Reno Omokri to ex-Kaduna gov: You failed screening woefully, you were a diplomatic liability
Emmanuel Addeh, Chuks Okocha, James Emejo in Abuja, Sunday Ehigiator and Funmi Ogundare
Former Kaduna State Governor and a stalwart of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Nasir el-Rufai yesterday responded to a plethora of issues, especially relating to his relationship with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, declaring that the president pointedly rejected him as a minister, and not the stage-managed National Assembly’s security report.
Speaking with Arise Television, THISDAY’s broadcast arm, in his first interview since exiting government in May 2023, el-Rufai, now a strong critic of his party, the APC as well as the Tinubu’s administration, maintained that there was no doubt that the president changed his mind against appointing him as the minister of power.
El-Rufai reiterated that Tinubu begged him to work with him initially, but that it was surprising that the Nigerian leader hid under the cover of a so-called security report to ease him out of his government.
The former minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) called on the president to release the security report that led to his rejection if it actually exists. He added that the president has invited him to a meeting since his rejection, stressing that although Tinubu told him they still both needed to work together, when asked in what area, the president was non-committal.
Having been a specialist adviser, minister and governor, el-Rufai stated that the talk of a rejection of his ministerial nomination due to a security report did not make sense.
“What was the security issue? I have been a governor for eight years in one of the most difficult states in the country. I had been minister 20 years earlier. I’ve been in public life in the last 25, 26 years. What is the security issue? Where is the report?
“What about other ministers far less qualified, far less experienced, with huge controversies around them that scaled through because the president made a call? So please leave that aside. I don’t want to focus too much on that. The president is a human being. He is entitled to change his mind. And it’s not an issue. It is a job I didn’t want in the first place,” he contended.
The former governor stated that although he told Tinubu he did not want to be a minister, the president prevailed on him that he wanted him (el-Rufai) to sort out Nigeria’s intractable power challenges as minister.
“I was not interested. He appealed to me, begged me and gave me a challenge. What was the challenge? Nobody had sorted out electricity. No president had defeated the electricity mafia. You and I can work to defeat it. It was the challenge that made me accept,” he added.
Describing himself as a ‘self-made man’, the former Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), rubbished insinuations that he could defect to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), hinting that although he was ready to work with any other party in 2027, the PDP was out of the question.
“I’m not in politics to get anything. I have a surname. I’m a self-made man. I had made my money before coming into public office. I don’t need anything. After eight years in Kaduna I was nearly burnt out.
“I was struggling for eight years and I wanted to take a break and I had my private plans. The president publicly appealed to me to put my plans on hold and through two months of negotiation we finally agreed that he would nominate me as minister and there were certain conditions I attached to that. I think along the line either the president changed his mind or something else because please don’t believe the story that the National Assembly rejected me.
“The National Assembly had nothing to do with this. The president didn’t want me in his cabinet. He changed his mind. Whatever it is, frankly I don’t care and I told him and I moved on,” the technocrat turned politician stated.
As it is today, el-Rufai argued that nobody in the region will vote for Tinubu in the north, stressing that there’s palpable anger against the current administration.
Disclosing that he supports some of the current administration’s economic policies, el-Rufai however stated that the sequencing is wrong.
Besides, el-Rufai stated that the quality of the people implementing the reforms leaves much to be desired, pointing out that some of the reforms are just wrong outright.
“You don’t address food inflation by destroying domestic agriculture through importation, for instance. Food prices may be going down, but farmers are being impoverished because they are being made to compete with subsidised agricultural products from Europe and other countries.
“So I have issues with many of them. And I’m in touch with many senior officials of the administration, and I give them my opinion privately. But I don’t want to go beyond that, because tomorrow they will say, oh, it’s because he was not made minister,” he explained.
According to el-Rufai, although he might still support a southerner in 2027, just like he did in 2023, a lot of consultations will have to be carried out before the decision is taken.
“I will evaluate the situation at the time and I will consult widely because when I supported President Tinubu before the primaries, it was a decision that the leaders of the APC took in Kaduna. Who would we support? Okay, we’ve succeeded in ensuring that power goes to the south. And we knew that all the northern candidates would go nowhere.
“Tinubu was not my friend. I was never close to him. But the consensus of the APC in Kaduna was that we should support Bola Tinubu because he is (was) the one that is (was) more likely to win,” the professional quantity surveyor said.
He also flayed his party, the APC for breaching its own laws, with the constitution providing that meetings must take place at least once in a quarter, even if just to give the government feedback on some of its policies. “In two years, the party has not met,” he said.
Although he has no immediate plans to leave the APC, he hinted that unless the party is reformed and returned to the right path, he was willing to work with any other political party except the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
“But now, I’m not leaving the APC. The APC has left me. We founded that party based on certain values. The party has left. I am stranded,” he added, stressing that “sooner or later, yI may have to find another platform to pursue those progressive values that I believe in, if I can’t find them in the APC.”
El-Rufai pointed out that he wasn’t sure he would be in the APC by 2027, stressing that if Tinubu hasn’t done well by 2027, he should be voted out, but quickly added that he would prefer that a southerner succeeds Tinubu.
Regardless of whatever ‘baggage’ the president contested with, he noted that the decision was to manage it after we won.
On the question of imbalance in government appointments, el-Rufai contended that it was not a south-west problem, but that the president was simply picking his boys and loyalists into government positions.
“I think that President Tinubu’s appointments are quite imbalanced. But unlike others that think the appointments are skewed towards South-west, no. Please, don’t blame the South-west for what one individual is doing. As a northerner and someone that lived half of his life under military rule, we have suffered that.
“…President Tinubu is appointing his own boys, not because they are Yoruba, but because they are his own boys. And most of the appointments do not even reasonably cover the South-west. So people should stop confusing the two. The appointments are not balanced. But it’s not a Yoruba thing,” he argued.
He added: “President Tinubu needs to do something about that. It’s still not too late, he can correct it. But there is palpable anger in the North, and all the people around him, all those telling him that everything is quiet, they cannot go to the North and say vote for APC or vote for Tinubu today.
“But it’s two years until the elections. It’s not too late to correct things. And I have passed this message through many of those close to him. I hope they have the guts to tell him,” he said.
El-Rufai also took a swipe at his successor, Governor Uba Sani as well as his one-time ally and current National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, saying pointedly that they are no longer his friends.
“Look, Uba Sani has been my friend for many, many years. But he is not my friend anymore. Because for me, friendship is a very important concept. God gave us our relatives. He chose our relatives for us. We have no choice. But thank God we can choose our friends. And for me, a friend is someone that has some fidelity, some ethical and moral standards, and will be there for you when you need him, not when it’s time to party or enjoy.
“And I try to live like that. And those that are my friends know that I will be there for them when they need me. And I will rise and defend them. That’s what I call a friend. Uba Sani is not my friend. Nuhu Ribadu is not my friend. They were my friends at some point, but not anymore,” el-Rufai affirmed.
On his troubles with the anti-corruption agencies, he blamed Ribadu, the NSA for everything, alleging that Ribadu was bent on eliminating any viable opposition to his 2031 presidential ambition.
“This project of destroying Nasir el-Rufai is Nuhu Ribadu’s conception. He’s the architect and he’s the builder of that project and he’s the one working with Uba Sani to implement it. So far, it has been frustrating for them because they have not been able to find anything.
“In fact, what they have resorted to doing in the last two weeks is to be calling lower-level people and some of my officials and saying, implicate Nasir el-Rufai and your problems will go away. This is what the ICPC has become. The EFCC is far more professional,” he maintained.
He added: I have never taken a penny of it. But somebody wants to destroy my reputation. Why? Nuhu Ribadu wants to be president in 2031. He has to eliminate every northerner that he thinks is in the radar. That’s what’s going on,” el-Rufai stated.
RIBADU: I WON’T JOIN ISSUES WITH NASIR EL-RUFAI
In a statement late yesterday night, Ribadu declined to join issues with el-Rufai whom he alleged had been baiting him with attacks on his person. He however denied discussing presidential ambition in 2031 with anyone, saying his focus was on his current assignment.
see full statement below:
My attention has been drawn to the interview granted by Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, the immediate past governor of Kaduna State Monday evening.
If my silence wouldn’t risk being construed as consent, I would have ignored him. I am too preoccupied with my current assignment as to get into a media fight with Nasir El-Rufai or anyone else.
Despite the incessant baiting and attacks I have never spoken ill of Nasir on record anywhere. This is out of respect for our past association and our respective families. I will not start today.
I however urge the public to disregard El-rufai’s statements against me.
For the avoidance of doubt, I want to put it on record that I have never discussed running for president in 2031 with anybody. All my focus and energy are geared completely towards the advancement of Nigeria and the success of the President Tinubu administration.
I therefore ask Nasir El-Rufai to allow me face my onerous national assignment just as I do not bother myself with his own affairs.
Meanwhile, an author and a strong defender of the Tinubu administration, Reno Omokri, has responded to el-Rufai, accusing him of lying about his ministerial nomination and eventual rejection.
“During the Senate confirmation process, the National Assembly requested security clearance from both national and international security and intelligence agencies, and it was discovered that Nasir el-Rufai failed his security screening woefully.
“He was considered a diplomatic liability to Nigeria because, on Thursday, February 7, 2019, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai threatened European Union observers with death if they intervened in Nigeria’s impending presidential elections, which were to take place on Saturday, February 16, 2019,” Omokri stated.
Omokri stressed that so strongly did the European Union view this threat that they wrote officially to the Government of Nigeria to protest and issued a public statement censuring Nigeria.
“Malam Nasir el-Rufai was also fingered as a major contributor to the genocide of Southern Kaduna Christians after he admitted on multiple occasions to paying killer herdsmen while he was governor.
“Thirdly, Nasir el-Rufai’s government was indicted in the Zaria Shiite Massacre of Saturday, December 12, 2015, where 438 Shiite men, women, children and infants were slaughtered in one of Africa’s worst human rights violations.
“Additionally, Mr. el-Rufai was specifically cited for demolishing the homes of his political opponents in Kaduna. For example, he demolished the home of Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi and Inuwa Abdulkadir, the then North-west Zonal Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress, who was an ally of Nasir el-Rufai’s political foe, Senator Shehu Sani.
“Then, there is the demolition of another critic’s home under the guise that the house hosted a sex party. It was later established that the so-called sex party was a prank, and the prankster was not even the owner of the building. Yet, the el-Rufai regime destroyed Aisha Yakubu’s home,” Omokri pointed out.
Finally, Omokri said that el-Rufai’s reckless utterances against Christians, whereby on Saturday, January 27, 2013, he insulted Jesus Christ, and on Friday, January 18, 2019, when he said, ‘Even if I bring the Pope, Christians will never vote for me’, worked against him.
“For these and other reasons, Malam Nasir el-Rufai failed his security clearance and could not be cleared by the Senate of the National Assembly. He has himself to blame for this, not the President or the NSA.
“Nigerians may recall that el-Rufai was not the only ministerial nominee who was refused clearance. Nasir el-Rufai and two others, including Danladi Sani, the Taraba state nominee, and Stella Okotete of Delta state, were rejected because security agencies refused to clear them.
“None of the others has blamed the duo of the president or his NSA. None. Except el-Rufai. Thereafter, Nasir el-Rufai withdrew his nomination and named his former Commissioner for Local Government, Jafaru Sani, as his replacement.
“The fact remains that Nasir el-Rufai is bitter that his desire to be a minister was scuttled, and in his bitterness, he is attacking those who are bringing betterment to Nigeria,” Omokri argued.
