• Shehu Sani's activist credentials failed on the alter of little tempest. He failed to prove his mettle when it mattered most • All his vocal self as seen on the floor of the Senate was all self-serving • Verdict - Shehu Sani demystified. He cares not about you and I but his personal survival and benefits -period!
"So Shehu Sani was fighting only for his own interest, for the injustice done to him, and once this was addressed he would be okay. He would not bother about the fate of the many others who had followed him in the struggle, and who also had suffered the same injustice, in particular, Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi, whose house was even demolished by el Rufai."
Shehu Sani is the Senator representing Kaduna Central Senatorial District in the Senate. He came to the Senate on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Shehu Sani is also a political activist. He was among those jailed by General Sani Abacha following his role for the actualization of June 12, 1993 mandate allegedly given to Moshod Abiola.
During the horse trading in the Senate for the enthronement of a new leadership of the Upper Legislative Chamber after 2015 elections, Shehu Sani belonged to a group known as the “Like Minds“, a rebel faction of APC members in the National Assembly who were opposed to the list of candidates penciled down by the APC leadership to lead the Senate. In the end, the “Like Minds” prevailed, which led to the election of Bukola Saraki and Ike Ekweremadu as Senate President and Deputy Senate President respectively.
On the floor of the Senate, Shehu Sani was very vocal. He never failed to comment on any issue slated for discussion. It was from Shehu Sani that we know that each of the Nigerian Senator goes home every month with about N12 million. As a matter of fact, if there is any prize to be given to most vocal senators, it would be shared between Senator Shehu Sani and Senator Dino Malaye. They are the people who make the Eight Senate tick and lively due to their quality contributions. They are the gadflies of the Senate.
Not minding that he is an APC member, Shehu Sani was always very critical of the activities of the APC led federal government and also of his home state, Kaduna. Indeed, he and his other colleague, Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi, who led the factional Akida group of APC, never spare Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State. They were responsible for the refusal by Senate to approve a World Bank loan for Kaduna State. In fact, they were vehemently opposed to el Rufai’s administration. This led to the two Senators being suspended by the mainstream APC in the state. They equally lost out at the just concluded APC congresses.
With the formation of the breakaway Reformed All Progressives Congress (R-APC), Shehu Sani threw his weight behind the group. In a television interview, Shehu Sani bemoaned the injustices allegedly metted on these aggrieved APC members, and said that the group had reached a point of no return. He stated that even if the new APC chairman, Adams Oshiomole, were to be a good surgeon, he had come too late, and that he, Shehu Sani, had already “left Egypt and was crossing the Red Sea”. With that statement everybody believed that Shehu Sani was already out of the APC.
When however the list of Senators that had defected from the APC last Tuesday was made public, Shehu Sani’s name was conspicuously missing. Many people started to ask why, whether it was a mistake, or a deliberate omission. Some of them reasoned that it was for strategic reasons, after all the name of the Senate President was equally not on the list.
Not long after, different stories began to emerge. One account from an online media had it that Shehu Sani was bought over by the the Presidency and that why he did not defect. That indeed Shehu Sani was the arrowhead of the coup that was to topple the Senate leadership. According to the story, while each of the other Senators loyal to the President was given N50 million, Shehu Sani was given N100 million and assured of a return ticket to the Senate, and that the Senator from Kaduna Central was to be made the Senate President. But the coup did not succeed.
Another online report however said that Shehu Sani had approached the PDP leadership, requesting to be paid N100 million for him to join the defecting Senators, but that the PDP brushed it aside, and insisted that it would not pay anybody any money to defect. Then he decided to go back to Egypt!
Shehu Sani himselg however came out with his own version. He did not comment on any of these alleged monetary inducements, which of course he must have read, but only said that his failure to defect was made possible by the intervention of Bola Tinibu, Adams Oshiomole and Balarabe Musa.
According to him, ” My defection was stopped by Asiwaju Tinibu, Oshiomole and Balarabe Musa. First of all they recognized and accepted the fact that an injustice has been done to me in Kaduna. Balarabe Musa invited me to his house, cautioned and counselled me against defection. Asiwaju did the same thing. Oshiomole reminded me of my activism and the struggles.
“They reminded me that all those who defected were former PDP members. I don’t have the pedigree of PDP. I am an activist. The assurance they gave me was that everything will be sorted out. They assured me that they will intervene on issues which I raised. Because of that I coud not defect”.
Well said. So Shehu Sani was fighting only for his own interest, for the injustice done to him, and once this was addressed he would be okay. He would not bother about the fate of the many others who had followed him in the struggle, and who also had suffered the same injustice, in particular, Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi, whose house was even demolished by el Rufai.
So it was only after Tinibu, Balarabe Musa and Oshiomole talked that Shahu Sani suddenly realized that he was an activist, and that he was not a member of PDP. Hope they only talked, and nothing exchanged hands. Interesting!
But why did Shehu Sani start advertising his intention to defect? Did those who left do the same?
Former military President, Ibrahim Babangida, himself a master strategist, once said that he had serious reservations about the so-called Nigerian socialists and activists, because as soon as a little offer is dangled before them, they will all fall for it. He only singled out Gani Fawehinmi who refused to compromise, and said he had great respect and admiration for him.
Think about Tai Solarin and his appointment as Chairman of Peoples Bank of Nigeria after his Ebony Magazine interview gafe that sparked off the May 1989 riots. Think about Woke Soyinka and his appointment as head of Federal Road Safety Corps commission, etc. They all compromised.
|
I began to wonder where the sudden confidence in PMB leadership came from. Have the killings been addressed, have service chiefs been sacked, have Adeosun been removed, have the Economy been revived, have Buhari become younger? so all these criticism was hypocritical. Shehu Sani is a disappointment. I wonder what Oshiomole did to him but however for stating that he believes in the leadership of Buhari, he has ruined his credibility for life & he will regret it. |
