A number one and founding member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and coordinator of the Tinubu/Shettima 2023 Presidential Marketing campaign in Zamfara State, Senator Kabiru Garba Marafa, has countered the Minister of State for Defence, Muhammad Bello Matawalle, over the latter’s scathing remarks about members of the Northern Elders Discussion board (NEF), saying that what his principal wanted had been loyalty and arduous work, not sycophancy from aides.
Marafa additionally famous that the Northern elders had been neither a burden nor political paperweights in anyway as insinuated by Matawalle.
Recall that Matawalle had in an announcement few days in the past in response to a criticism of Tinubu authorities by NEF, titled; ‘Tinubu Presidency: Northern Elders Discussion board, A Political Burden to the North, They Do Not Converse for the Area’, described the Northern elders as mere ‘paperweights and a burden’.
However, in an announcement issued to journalists in Abuja on Sunday, Marafa stated slightly than negatively portraying the Northern elders, Matawalle ought to have listed the achievements, programmes, insurance policies, and initiatives of President Bola Tinubu within the North and the nation as a complete within the first 10 months of the administration.
He stated calling the elders of the North, which gave the best variety of votes to make sure electoral victory for the Tinubu presidency, was counterproductive and an awesome disservice to the president, who’s working tirelessly in the direction of addressing the quite a few challenges going through all segments and sectors of the nation like terrorism, insurgency, financial and monetary malfeasance and infrastructural decay, amongst others.
Marafa insisted that what President Tinubu wanted from his appointees is help, loyalty and arduous work to actualise the Renewed Hope Agenda conceived to return the nation to the trail of progress and prosperity, not sycophancy and unguarded statements.
Marafa, who represented Zamfara Central Senatorial District within the Senate from 2011 -2019, known as on Minister Matawalle to withdraw the offensive assertion and tender, directly, an unreserved apology to the Northern elders and Northerners on the whole.
“Within the final one week, I’ve been inundated with calls from well-meaning and outstanding stakeholders in our area and get together, the APC, who know my relationship with the President.
“They’re anxious and disturbed that the unlucky assertion by the Minister of State for Defence, if not addressed, might have an effect on the president’s electoral fortunes in our area as a result of will probably be seen as if the minister spoke the thoughts of the president or the Presidency.
“The crux of the matter is that; whether or not you want them or not these individuals are known as Northern Elders, so, until they’re stripped of that title by the folks of the area, insulting them is tantamount to insulting your entire folks of the area.
“It’s not in our tradition and upbringing to insult elders. No descent society will discuss with its elders as a burden and paperweights. The North isn’t an exception.
“As one of many senators who labored very carefully with Asiwaju as get together chief (as he was then known as) from the formation of APC via the primaries that led to the emergence of Basic Muhammadu Buhari as APC presidential candidate in Lagos, the politics of the Nationwide Meeting management in 2015 and 2019 and the processes and intrigues that characterised the 2023 Presidential Primaries, I can say with out mincing phrases that President Tinubu holds the North, the Northerners, and their leaders in excessive esteem.
“Though, I’m not the mouthpiece of both the president or the Presidency, as a Northerner and an elder within the area, as an APC stakeholder and one which has labored carefully with each the president and the Vice President, I wish to state categorically that this view expressed by Mr Matawalle is his private opinion and never in any manner that of Mr President or the Presidency, and may, subsequently, be disregarded.
“I do know for certain that the North, Northerners and the Northern elders are neither a burden nor a paperweight within the scheme of issues within the area and the nation as a complete. The president shares this view, and, subsequently, he’s with me on this,” Senator Marafa said.
