Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriation, Ahmed Mohammed
Maccido, yesterday, asked Hon. Bitrus Kaze (PDP, Plateau) to immediately
apologise to the Sultan of Sokoto.
He also warned him not to denigrate
the office and person of the Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III.
Maccido’s warning stemmed from
Kaze’s condemnation of the Sultan over his call for amnesty for the Boko Haram
sect.
Hon. Kaze had faulted the Sultan’s
plea for amnesty.
He had said such call for amnesty
showed the level of high-calibre support Boko Haram enjoyed in the North.
But Maccido, a prince of Sokoto has,
however, warned Kaze to either retract the statement or apologise personally to
the Sultan.
Maccido insisted that Kaze should
quickly retrace his steps as the Caplihate views his statement as a personal
attack on the Sultan.
“I have no problem with what the
Sultan has said because if you look at it, this is not a statement made by the
Sultan alone; it’s an agreed statement; unanimously agreed upon by a certain
group of people in the northern part of this country. He sat with emirs, he sat
with ulamas and at the end of it, they deliberated on it and discussed and
concluded and agreed that, yes, it is the right thing to do.”He came out and
aired it as his view.
“So, I don’t really have a problem
with that. But my problem is the fact that somebody, an individual, who has, of
course, the right to say what he wants to say as a Nigerian said he disagreed
with the Sultan in totality; that is his right as a Nigerian.”
“But to come out later in the same
statement to say that, that goes to show that Boko Haram is being sponsored by
people in high places (means) he’s tying the Sultan to Boko Haram; implying
that the Sultan is one of the sponsors of Boko Haram.
“I don’t agree with him and he
should be very careful with what he says.”As far as I’m concerned, that
statement is mischievous because Hon Bitrus Kaze should not be speaking to the
Sultan in such a manner. The Sultan of Sokoto is not his age mate; he should
not come out and say that the Sultan is one of the sponsors of Boko Haram
because that is what is implied in that statement.”I disagree with him and I’m
telling him in strong words that he should either retract his words or he
should apologise in person to the Sultan because this is personal. I would also
repeat it that he should be careful with his statement.”
“Last week, the Sultan appealed to
President Goodluck Jonathan to grant total amnesty to the Boko Haram sect, much
in line with the same gesture granted armed militants in the Niger Delta
area.”The President promptly rejected the plea on the grounds that amnesty
cannot be granted to a faceless group.”
Source: Leadership
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