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The factional Chairman of the Nigeria Governors Forum, who is also the Governor of Plateau State, Mr. Jonah Jang, has given reasons for the inability of Nigeria governors to unite.
He said the activities of some of the governors, particularly the Governor of Kano State, Alhaji Rabiu Kwankwaso, was part of the issues causing ripples among the governors.
Jang was responding to the allegation made by Kwankwaso on Wednesday that the Presidency was responsible for the division among the governors.
He said in order to create the division, President Goodluck Jonathan gave each governor in the camp of Jang among the governors N2bn each as ecological fund.
The Kano state governor, who said the money was taken from the common pulse of the country, was not given to governors who voted for the Governor of Rivers State, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi during the NGF chairmanship election.
Apart from this, he said the Presidency was benefiting from the division among the governors and appealed to his colleagues to come together in the interest of the people and their states.
The factional chairman however disagreed, stating that the “dishonesty and deceit of Kano state Governor, Alhaji Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso is directly linked to the present division among the governors and not the Presidency.”
Jang said, in a statement by the Media Officer in charge of his faction of the NGF, Mr. Kassim Yakubu, in Abuja on Thursday, that if anybody received any bribe it must be Kwankwaso, who he said nominated him (Jang ) for the Chairmanship of the NGF when the northern governors met to agree on a consensus candidate.
Jang declared that the alleged act of dishonesty aided by a few other governors sowed the seed of discord amongst the governors, adding that it was a pity that Kwankwaso and his group were now finding it difficult to live with the consequences of their action.
He said because of this, the Kwankwaso group was busy throwing spurious and unsubstantiated allegations with the hope that Nigerians do not have any memory of the events leading to the division of the forum.
He said, “The opposition governors’ forum is getting desperate as they see their numbers dropping daily and think they can deceive Nigerians with baseless allegations.
“Governor Kwankwanso should tell Nigerians if I gave him money to nominate me. That grand deceit of nominating me and doing something else is the foundation of the division. He should tell Nigerians how and when the N2bn was paid.
“When he proudly made it public that he was being smart by nominating me and leading others to vote against me, what was he expecting?
“That deceit and dishonesty was the beginning of playing politics with the Nigeria Governors’ Forum and now he is not happy with what he created. He can always come back to the forum of the chairman he nominated.”
Jang called on Nigerians to always test the veracity of statements which he said could be designed to mislead and incite the public, adding that the promoters of such statements might be out to seek relevance at the expense of the nation.
