ARMSTRONG ALLAHMAGANI, Bauchi
A former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has alleged that Bauchi State governor, Bala Mohammed, is spreading “falsehood” in an attempt to malign him ahead of 2023.
This was contained in a statement signed and sent to our Correspondent in Bauchi by his media aide, Turaki Hassan, on Sunday.
He said that stories and images are being circulated on social media to the effect that he (Dogara) is running for the office of the Vice President with the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, Sen Bola Tinubu, for President in 2023.
Hassan said that the initial decision was to ignore those circulating the materials since they are utterly baseless however, “it appears that the promoters of this fallacy are unrelenting in spreading the falsehood and have now succeeded in making it sound believable to the extent that even some conventional and ‘credible’ media platforms are beginning to take it up.”
He added:
“In order to stop the further spread of this deliberate mischief whose objective is yet to be ascertained, the public is hereby, advised to disregard and totally discountenance the purported story and pictures for what they are – handiwork of mischief makers.
“These stories and pictures, we understand, are being sponsored by officials of the Bauchi State government in their desperate bid to lend credence to the infantile delusions of their principal, captured in his ludicrous postulations that Rt. Hon. Dogara left the PDP just because he was “deceived” by the APC with the promise of a position come 2023.
“Recall that the Bauchi state Governor, Sen Bala Mohammed had publicly alluded to this and has continued to push these narratives all in an effort to malign and disparage the person of Rt. Hon. Dogara and divert attention of the people from issues of poor governance in the state.”
According to him, 2023 is still years away and, therefore, it is unnecessary, distracting and insensitive to start making unfounded declarations at this time when all hands ought to be on deck in tackling the challenges of our nationhood.
“Furthermore, to our best knowledge, no political party sells nomination and expression of interest forms for the post of a running mate as he/she is only appointed or selected by a flag bearer.
“It is therefore preposterous for anyone to claim that someone is running for the position of VP when no flag-bearer has emerged,” he stated.
The media aide pointed out that Dogara is busy helping to rebuild and reposition the APC in Bauchi State and wishes to be allowed to focus on just that.
NATIONAL ACCORD had reported that Dogara, who represents Dass/Tafawa Balewa/Bogoro Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives, defected from the People’s Democratic Party to the APC in Bauchi state.
In a letter of resignation from the PDP which he addressed to the Chairman of the PDP Bogoro ‘C’ Ward, Bogoro Local Government Area of Bauchi state dated 24th July, 2020, Dogara, said he was resigning his membership of the ruling party in the state because governor Bala Mohammed was making the same mistakes the former governor made which led to his defeat in the 2019 election in the state.
He raised six issues of unfulfillment of campaign promises, mismanagement of resources, lack of respect to elders and traditional rulers in the state, in his letter as his reasons for dumping the ruling party in the state.
DISCLAIMER
The OPINION / COLUMN is authored by independent contributors to the National Accord Newspaper. While contributors adhere to our editorial guidelines, they are not employed by the National Accord Newspaper. The perspectives and opinions expressed herein are solely those of the author and do not represent the views of the National Accord Newspaper or its staff.