•As Aminu Dabo says ruling party is playing with fire

Iheanacho Nwosu, Abuja

 The camp of former governor of Kano State, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso (Kwankwasiya), will meet today in Abuja to decide on the option of leaving the All Progressives Congress (APC) or sticking to the fold.

  Kwankwaso and the incumbent governor of the state, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, have been locked in a battle over the control of the APC structure in the state.    Last week, the state Commissioner of Police, Rabiu Yusuf, asked Kwankwaso to shelve plans of visiting the state. But last Thursday, the Senate waded into the matter and directed the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, to provide security cover to Kwankwaso to visit Kano.

  Addressing newsmen in Abuja, an APC stalwart and former Managing Director of the Nigeria Ports Authority (NPA), Aminu Dabo, declared that the loyalists of Kwankwaso were concerned about some developments in the state chapter of the party and have resolved to meet to decide the next political step to take.

  He accused the leadership of the state of using the Presidency and the APC national leadership to thwart the planned visit. He claimed that the rift between Ganduje and Kwankwaso would have consumed the former but for the involvement of the Presidency.

  Dabo said: “Governor Abdullahi Ganduje has suddenly realised that his quarrel with our leader, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso is overwhelming him; that the people of Kano State are not happy with him and he is becoming very unpopular in the state.

  “He has realised suddenly that the only way for him to survive or to feel protected is to bring the Presidency and the national leadership of our party into it. This is going to be very serious and the Presidency, especially President Muhammadu Buhari, will pay a very huge political price. The consequence of taking side with Governor Ganjuje in this crisis will be huge because the people of Kano State are not happy with the governor and what is happening.’’   Reminding President Buhari that Kano State remains his ‘’biggest and strongest’’ political base in the country, and that the state gave him almost two million votes in the 2015 presidential election, Dabo advised the President to be politically correct in relating with all the stakeholders involved in the current crisis in Kano APC.

  Asked to describe the state of affairs in the Kano APC and the way out of the current crisis, Dabo said the situation was dicey.

He wondered why the police and the Presidency would assist Ganjuje to scuttle a mere visit by Kwankwaso to his senatorial district.   He said: “How can you stop a normal visit? If you think you are popular why not allow other people to do their own activities? How can you stop a serving senator from visiting his senatorial district? This is very unfortunate.’’

  Tracing the origin of the crisis, he linked it to what he called “betrayal of trust’’ by Ganduje. He added:  “The situation has been on for quite some time. As you can remember, our leader worked so hard to install the current governor with all the support of his followers, but unfortunately he came and betrayed that trust. There was nothing personal. Governor Ganduje derailed from the actual concept, ideology and the system of Kwankwasiya group and all efforts made to let him realise his wrong steps were ignored. He has been treating us as foreigners; we are now like an opposition within our party. He drove us out of the system and brought entirely new people, which is quite unfortunate.’’