EXCLUSIVE:Shehu Sani Details How Bribery & Corruption Mar APC

Shehu Sani, a Senator of the Federal Republic is also a noted human right activist who was sentenced to death by the former Head of State, Sani Abacha alongside the Late General Shehu Musa Yar’adua and former President Olusegun Obasanjo on what was generally believed to be a phantom charge of coup plot.

In this exclusive interview with our Northern Bureau Chief, Mohammed Askirama, Sani noted that though President Muhammadu Buhari is a man of principles and integrity, unfortunately some dubious people in the party have turn the last primaries of APC into a toll gate to extort party members

The Senator representing Kaduna Central is still bitter that the All Progressive Congress betrayed him by denying him the ticket to return to the Senate in 2019. He decided therefore, to dump APC and contest for the senate again on the ticket of the People’s Redemption Party, PRP and was confident the party will sack the ruling party in the State.
EXCERPTS:
How would you describe the APC, the party that brought to the Senate?
Presently, the party lacks internal democracy, lacks focus and does not appreciate loyalty. In fact, the APC will collapsed in 2019 after President Muhammadu Buhari might have quit the stage.
The party which was formed with the sole intention of removing PDP from power, has today became worse than the PDP. It has failed to manage its successes and today almost all state chapters of the party are in one crisis or the other.
The party initially gave you automatic ticket to return to the senate but later accepted Uba Sani from a congress organized by the party in Kaduna, what really happened?
I am sure you are one of those that are following the way and manner I lost my ticket. There was this aspect that a serving Managing Director in the Buhari Administration allegedly bribed the APC National Officers with the sum of 2 million dollars to remove my name and replace it with that of Uba Sani.
Secondly, Governor Nasiru El-Rufai moved to Abuja and did all he could to ensure that my name is removed and the reason for that was because I refused to assist him in the Senate to secure the sum of $350 million dollars foreign loan his government wanted to obtain.
Right from day one, we parted ways with the governor and have been operating on different page but I can tell you today that APC is a dying party in Kaduna State. It has completely derailed from the main reason some patriotic Nigerians came together and form the party to rescue Nigeria from PDP. Unfortunately, the APC today is worse than the PDP.
Your new party, the PRP is a party that does not have money bags in its fold. Secondly, the general belief is that the only popular parties are the PDP and APC. How do you intend to win on PRP ticket?
Our people still have tremendous respect for late Mallam Aminu Kano, Sa’ad Zungur, Late Abubakar Rimi, Sabo Bakinzuwo and Mallam Balarabe Musa who is still living. And as for me, I stood for Kaduna teachers when El-Rufai sacked them. I stopped the governor from demolishing people’s houses and properties in Kaduna; I stood for traditional rulers that were disgraced by the Governor; I stood for Health and Local Government workers including the disabled when the Governor wanted to deal with them.
I also rendered assistance to thousands of those who voted for me as dividends of democracy and our people are obvious of the hardship they went through under the El-Rufai administration and I can assure you under free and fair election, I will win my seat again.
There was this allegation that the Kaduna State Governor made against you that in 2015, he gave you over 100 million naira to pay for party agents but you did not do so. What actually is the true story?
In 2015, our party at the national level promised to make available money through state governors so that they will pay for our agents and in Kaduna whatever our party gave out came through the governor.
Also, it could be recalled that I told Kaduna people in 2105 that I don’t have money to give them but I promised them that if they elected me, I will do my best to represent them and if money was given, it must be to agents not me by the governor.
I have since taken him to court for false allegations against me and I am demanding for 5 billion naira compensation.
Similarly, he took me to court and he is demanding for 2 billion naira compensation. So, time will tell what will happen next, but I can tell you, Kaduna people will make the worse mistake of their life if they allow this Governor to be re-elected.
As for the president, I have tremendous respect for him, but I was prevailed upon by Senator Bola Tinubu, Adams Oshiomhole, Balarabe Musa and other well-meaning Nigerians to remain in APC when my colleagues were defecting to other parties. The president would have intervened so that they will give me my ticket because when I did not leave APC, they promised that they will address all the short comings in the party but they did not do that and I left.
I Senator Shehu Sani, people can check, I did not obtain a single house or a plot since I became a senator, right from when I was young, we were in PRP with our families and grew up with the philosophy of the PRP as such, we don’t believe in stealing public money.
How do you intend to retain your seat against the candidate being supported by the Governor?
First, we are already embarking on serious house to house campaign. Secondly, the Governor want to put Uba Sani there so that when he finished as Governor, he will pick the senatorial ticket from Uba Sani.
People should know that Uba Sani was my former boy and he cannot look at me in the face and said he is challenging me; he is using the Governor to win in Kaduna Central the way the Governor is using Buhari’s name to secure a second term.
But El-Rufai and Buhari are not of the same character or principle as such, I will call on Kaduna People again, it will be disastrous if they allow this man to comeback because in his second term, he will definitely destroy many people and sack more civil servants and all the places he marked for demolition but suspended, he will definitely carryout his threat in 2019.