Date: 2018-07-29

Rafiu Ibrahim, senator representing Kwara south, says Nasir el-Rufai, governor of Kaduna state, is one of the people who got the All Progressives Congress (APC) into the current "mess" it found itself.

Ibrahim, one of the APC senators who joined the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) earlier in the week, said this in reaction to the comment of el-Rufai that the 8th senate is the worst in the history of the country.

The lawmaker disagreed with el-Rufai, saying facts do not support his position. "May be we need to educate this aggrieved governor that this senate in three years already has the highest number of bills with relevance to improving the economy, eliminating insecurity and corruption since 1999, even though we still have 10 months to the end of our tenure," he said in a statement. "Similarly, we have treated more petitions than the number that all the past senate combined had done. Our interventions on key issues that affect the day to day living of Nigerians have remained unparalleled."

Ibrahim said el-Rufai is feeling pained by the rejection of the $350 million World Bank loan that the upper legislative chamber refused to give consent to.

He wondered why the governor could attack the senate when he allegedly tried to lobby Senate President Bukola Saraki over the issue.

"El- Rufai is an aggrieved governor. He is pained by the rejection of his request for foreign loans by the Senate committee on foreign and local debt which is headed by a senator from Kaduna state, Shehu Sanni. The Governor has been speaking from both sides of the mouth," the statement read.

"He had sent several persons to the senate president on this loan. I am aware that when he sent the current minister of finance to Dr. Saraki, the latter made it known that he too was helpless on the issue as there was no personal reason that will make him stand against such a request. The senate president advised the governor to reach out to the three senators from the state and get them to support the decision as he, the senate president, would find it difficult to overrule the senators, particularly since one of them is the chairman of the concerned committee. The three Senators from Kaduna state insisted that an approval for the loan would sentence Kaduna State to many years of indebtedness.

"I am aware of the text message that this same wl-Rufai sent to Saraki few weeks ago,thanking him for the useful and supportive discussion the senate president had with the minister of finance on the Kaduna loan issue and commending this same Saraki for the leadership he has provided on a number of issues.

"For him to now be making this kind of nonsensical and reckless statements against the senate president shows that he is a double-faced, reckless and immature. People should ignore him. He is one of the people who destroyed APC up to the point that it is and President Buhari had better realised that with a supporter like el-Rufai, he does not need an opponent again."