The Member representing Pankshin/Kanke/Kanam Federal Constituency of Plateau State in the House of Representatives, Rt Hon. Yusuf Adamu Gagdi has opened up on why former Governor Simon Lalong could not deliver his ward, local government and the state to President Bola Tinubuat the February polls.
Gagdi said the acrimonious religious bigotry imputed into the 2023 election in Plateau State, was responsible for Lalong’s failure. He added that the former governor who was the director general of the All Progressive Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council could not deliver the same faith ticket of the party.
The lawmaker stated this in response to what he described as raining of diatribes and invectives on the person of the former Governor by a former Minister of Information and Communication Dasuki Nakande, saying that was borne out of sheer envy.
Gagdi however said, Lalong’s APC was not defeated by Nakande’s new found bride, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which he defected to in the build up to the presidential polls as the party came distant third in a state it had never lost Presidential election since 1999.
“Lalong was branded ‘enemy’ of Plateau State by Nakande’s PDP not merely for accepting to lead the campaign for joint Muslim ticket, but they used it as a tool to further disinform the gullible Plateau Christian voters as a confirmation of his affinity with Nakande’s Jos North Muslim community, because he treated them as part and parcel of Plateau citizens, rather than the pariah treatment meted on them under the previous PDP administrations in the state, which Nakande is a member.
“For allowing democracy to take full swing at the grassroots, where it was possible for Nakande’s fellow Muslim to emerge democratically elected Chairman in Jos North, Lalong was dubbed an antichrist by his fellow brethren, because of the lies sold to them by Nakande’s fellow PDP, who used same to campaign against the APC in the 2023 elections,” he said.
Gagdi said Nakande, a former member of APC who defected to PDP shortly after Lalong was named the ruling party’s Presidential Campaign DG, should ordinarily maintain sealed lips when APC and how Tinubuadministration should form its cabinet is discussed.
He stressed that: “As someone who left APC to PDP shortly before the 2023 general elections, it is commonsensically meddlesome for Nakandeto delve into the affairs of a party he wished had lost at the polls; even more so, that he left the party because the person named to lead the campaign was someone he never wished well.
“I am writing as someone who knows how Lalong had held Nakande in high regards and as someone who once accompanied the former governor to Nakande’s house in Abuja to greet him when he (Nakande) took ill sometime ago. I was privy to their discussions and the genuine love and concern Lalong expressed to Nakande at that time.
“The least I expected was for Nakande to exercise restraint, if for any reason he must comment on the internal political wranglings in the APC, and do so as an onlooker that he is, rather than dabble into the arena.
“There is no disputing the fact that Nakande was Tinubu’s political foot soldier in Plateau State, while Lalong was with Amaechi during the 2022 APC Presidential primary. But how that translated into their individual commitment and enthusiasm towards the electoral victory of President Tinubu, with the former ally turning into a political foe, while the former opponent leading the presidential campaign to victory, tells more of who is the true lover of Tinubu. A true friend is one who stands through thick and thin to the end.
“In a Christian dominated state that experienced incessant religious upheavals, every sane person should expect that leading the campaigns of a joint Muslim presidential ticket is a daunting task that only the bravest of warriors can undertake – a description that Lalong perfectly fits into.”
