Senator Kabir Marafa, a leader of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) in Zamfara State says the defection of Governor Bello Matawalle from the opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to the APC is in violation of the Supreme Court judgement which declared that the APC had no candidate in the 2019 governorship election in Zamfara.
The lawmaker of the 8th Senate in an interview on ARISE NewsNight on Thursday said if strong reservations expressed by party members over the defection are not managed properly will snowball into a major crisis that will rock the very foundation of the ruling party.
He also spoke of why he believes Matawalle should not be the leader of the APC in the Northern Nigerian Zamfara state.
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Giving further clarifications on the Supreme Court judgment, Marafa said, “As far as the law is concerned, there was no APC in the 2019 ballot paper, so APC cannot have a governor, APC cannot have senators, APC cannot have members of House of Representatives and APC cannot have members of the state’s house of assembly, according to that Supreme Court judgment.
“So, any attempt by anybody to say he is the governor of APC, between 2019 and 2023 without reason of death or resignation that could have warranted issues of bye-election, cannot work. Doing so is acting against the judgment of the Supreme Court. You are making nonsense of our judicial system. These issues are going to come up.”
In what appears to be a sign of cracks in the ranks of the APC in Zamfara, Marafa distanced himself from the defection of the state governor, saying “We have accepted our fate. We are the ones that fought, we lost and we have accepted that in good fate. “Leave us where we are. You don’t have to rub it on us. Doing so will just ignite series of problems that might spell doom to APC. We don’t want it to happen, so, what people are saying is APC be fair, be just.”
He also stated why he believes Matawalle should not be the leader of the APC in Zamfara State.
He insisted that the Chairman of the Caretaker Committee of the APC, Mai Mala Buni, erred by announcing Matawalle as the leader of the party in Zamfara State.
“APC should let the sleeping dog lie. Mai Mala Buni, Chairman of its Caretaker Committee doesn’t have the power under the constitution to make such pronouncements,” he said.
