A member of the House of Representatives, Abdulmumin Jibrin has disclosed that a former Kano State Governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, is still open to joining the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
Jibrin, a chieftain of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), spoke on Wednesday, saying the doors have not closed for the former NNPP presidential candidate to team up with President Bola Tinubu in the APC.
“As far as that [joining APC] is concerned, he has always maintained that his doors are open, our doors are open for discussions. Everything is a possibility,” he said on Channels Television’s Politics Today.
Talks about Kwankwaso, who contested against Tinubu in 2023, joining the APC have made headlines recently as political permutations intensify ahead of the 2027 elections.
That appeared to have fizzled out, but Jibrin said the door to Kwankwaso joining APC “is not closed. He has never said it is closed.”
When asked what may be stalling Kwankwaso’s movement into the APC, the Chairman of the House Committee on Housing and Habitat said, “Even within the APC in Kano, you may have a situation where some vested interest won’t want us to come in, maybe because of their own interest — somebody wanting to be governor or whatever else.”
According to him, the Kwankwasiyya Movement, which the NNPP’s former presidential candidate leads, is a strong group that cannot be ignored in the country’s political permutations.
The lawmaker has been an ally of President Tinubu and has visited him several times, sparking rumours that the House of Representatives member may dump the NNPP.
During the show, Jibrin did not affirm that he is joining the APC but said, “Well, I keep saying everything is possible”.
He explained that, as a Kwankwasiyya, he does not need the former presidential candidate’s permission to leave the NNPP.
“No, at my age, I think I’m old enough to make decisions for myself,” the member representing Kiru/Bebeji Constituency of Kano said.
In the 2023 election, Kwankwaso scored 1,496,687 votes and came in a distant fourth. Tinubu of the APC got 8,794,726 votes, while Atiku was second with 6,984,520. Peter Obi was third with 6,101,533 votes.
