Zamfara: Don’t’ Move from Honour to Dishonour, Marafa Warns Oshiomhole

Deji Elumoye in Abuja

A member of the National Assembly, Senator Kabiru Marafa (APC Zamfara Central), has advised the national chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, to stand by the truth as regards the party’s botched primaries in Zamfara State last October. Marafa stated this in a letter addressed to Oshiomhole on Saturday in reaction to his reported endorsement on a television programme of Governor Abdulaziz Yari’s faction of APC in the state. The senator, who is Chairman of Senate Committee on Petroleum (Downstream), urged the party chairman to maintain his position as a leader by standing by the truth, and not allow pressure from some interested individuals to change him.

“It’s quite unfortunate and disheartening to watch the hitherto respected comrade rubbishing his hard earned name before the whole world,” Marafa said in the letter to Oshiomhole.
“Oshiomhole performed creditably well during the party primaries, as he led the party aright to the admiration of all, including those in the opposition parties. He aligned himself with the masses, against some state governors who assumed the position of the Almighty in their respective states. Why do you want to change, my Comrade?” the senator declared.

Marafa advised Oshiomhole not to allow pressure to derail him.
“What Oshiomhole said was nothing but a wicked lie that can neither stand moral nor legal scrutiny. Records and documentary evidences abound everywhere that APC did not conduct primaries in Zamfara State due to the attitude of the state governor who threatened publicly to send Oshiomhole to the graveyard if he dares him,” Marafa stated.

“Oshiomhole at the peak of the controversy affirmed the fact that no primaries was conducted and his famous video of ‘primaries are to be conducted not by state governments nor by state party chairmen but by the panels sent by the party’s NWC,’ is still very much available on the internet,” he added.

The senator further said, “Equally available is INEC’s letter to him (Chief Oshiomhole) that they received reports from their local office in Gusau that APC didn’t conduct valid primaries as at 12am on Sunday, October 7, 2018. It was based on this fact that INEC said it wasn’t expecting candidates from (APC) and you, Chief Oshiomhole, responded by accepting the fact that APC didn’t conduct primaries but you did consensus! A simple google search will amplify these facts.”

Marafa also reminded Oshiomhole that Yari sat in company of his state factional chairman of APC and announced the results of his primaries live on television and the video was still very much available on the net.

He stated, “It’s not only shocking but unbelievable that our comrade chairman, likable by all, will change his narrations at the tail end of the match and this is a minus to the Comrade that I have known to be a respecter of rules and facts.”
Marafa emphasised that he approached the court over the party primary “to correct the anomalies in our state for the benefit of our people”.

He explained, “This thing is beyond me or Yari or even the APC, it’s for our people who bear the brunt of bad governance at the state level. It may interest you, Mr Oshiomhole, to know that as I’m writing this to you more than 75 percent of the people of Zamfara are not sleeping in their houses at night. There is an estimated over 200,000 orphans, 60,000 widows, 5,000 raped victims, about 5000 abducted persons and unknown number of refugees in Zamfara State! Haba!”
He added, “We should be concerned about the lives and wellbeing of our people while we should not only be interested in votes and number of states, senators and members APC got nationwide.”