In an exclusive interview with PREMIUM TIMES Wednesday, Mr. Kwankwaso said the president was after his life and had ordered the withdrawal of half of his security details in a ploy to open him up to physical attacks.
“I have told my friends, and people of Kano, Nigerians and indeed the international community to hold Jonathan responsible for whatever happens to Kwankwaso, his family or even the people of Kano state,” Mr. Kwankwaso said at Kano State governor’s lodge in Abuja. Video after the cut....
He accused the president of igniting crisis in Kano State after a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Lamido Sanusi, emerged the emir of Kano Sunday.
Presidential spokespersons, Reuben Abati and Doyin Okupe, did not respond to PREMIUM TIMES’ requests for comments Wednesday.
The relationship between President Jonathan and Governor Kwankwaso, which for months had been all but warm, deteriorated in 2013 after Mr. Kwankwaso decamped from the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to the All Progressives Congress, APC.
Since then, both men have openly accused each other of corruption and ineptitude.
Mr. Sanusi’s emergence, Sunday, as emir of the powerful Kano emirate, revved up the squabble.
The presidency and the PDP were clearly opposed to the candidacy of the former CBN boss, who was removed from his post by Mr. Jonathan in February.
Protests broke out in Kano shortly after the announcement of the new emir, as his supporters clashed with those of his opponent, the son of the former emir, Ado Bayero, who died Friday.
Mr. Kwankwaso told PREMIUM TIMES he has “credible information” the president instructed his supporters in Kano to unleash “mayhem” on the state.
“We don’t know his intention, but, certainly the intention is not good,” he said. “We have to tell him that igniting crisis in Kano is not in the interest of anybody. We have enough crisis already in the country, and now they are funding their stooges in Kano to protest and burn government properties.”
The governor accused the president of igniting crisis in Kano because the state is controlled by the APC.
“Recently, we also lost an esteemed Emir in Gombe and they basically followed the same process to elect a new emir, but they did not say anything because it is a PDP state.
“Now they are funding crisis in our state, I have never seen something like this,” the governor said.
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