Political leaders caution Tinubu about Kano election for national stability

Leaders of the civil society and political parties in Kano State have appealed to President Bola Tinubu to respect the results of the recent governorship election in order to maintain peace and stability in Nigeria.

Abba Kabir Yusuf of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) defeated Nasiru Yusuf Gawuna, the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), in the Kano election. Tinubu was advised by the elders not to take legal action to overturn the results in a roundtable discussion facilitated by Chief Oguntade Omolewa of the Forum for National Integration and Development.

Kano State Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf filed an appeal to contest his removal by the Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal, and the Court of Appeal, located in Abuja, is anticipated to rule on the appeal.

On September 20, 2023, Yusuf was dismissed by a three-judge panel headed by Justice Oluyemi Osadebay for violating the INEC’s seal or signature, which rendered 165,663 of his votes void.

This resulted in Ganuwa keeping his 890,705 votes while the governor’s votes dropped to 853,939.

Omolewa, however, urged President Tinubu to practice inclusive and national cohesiveness politics rather than divisive ones when he spoke at the ceremony yesterday.
Reminding Tinubu of his own history as an opposition leader who was permitted to manage Lagos State in spite of PDP’s hegemony at the federal level was civil society activist and former Alliance National Party presidential candidate Moshood Shittu.

When issuing the reserved judgment on Kano, he requested the appellate court to give careful thought to the interests of national security and welfare.

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“We, of course, wouldn’t want a political crisis in Kano, which is why we support using discretion and intelligence in the administration of justice,” he stated.

At the 2023 governorship elections, “the people of Kano voted in large numbers for the NNPP governor Abba Kabir Yusuf.”