By Chesa Chesa
Following the affirmation by the Appeal Court of the victory of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the Kano State gubernatorial election, the party’s national chairman, Umar Ganduje has assured party faithful that the victory would be repeated at the Supreme Court if the defeated New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) chooses to appeal the judgment.
This was Ganduje’s reaction to the Appeal Court decision which sacked the NNPP Governor, Abba Yusuf, in favour of the APC candidate, Nasiru Gawuna, who had earlier been declared the winner by the lower election tribunal.
Addressing journalists in Abuja shortly after the judgement on Friday, the party chairman, who is the immediate past Governor of Kano, thanked the judiciary for the judgment and declared it a victory for democracy and Kano State.
He went on to declare that “probably they (NNPP) will go to the Supreme Court which is part of democracy. There is nothing wrong for them to go to the Supreme Court. We too, we are ready to meet them in Supreme Court. And Inshallahu, we will win in Supreme Court as well”.
He assured the people of Kano State that in the end, Gawuna, who was his deputy while he was Governor, would even outperform him in delivering good governance to them.
His words: “We have to thank the judiciary. There is no doubt this is a victory for democracy. It is a victory for APC and a victory for Kano state.
“This is an indication that democracy is has come to stay in Nigeria. Democracy we can say is matured in Nigeria. We have to thank all those stakeholders even the political parties, even the NNPP that took us to the Appeal Court.
“We have to thank them because they are part of the process of democracy. There is no doubt that after election you get to litigations. And the end result is always determined by the judiciary.
“For Kano State, this victory is for all of us. We are fully aware, we know what happened during the election – a lot of malpractices – and we took the issue to the tribunal. And by the grace of God we got a fair judgement in favour of our great party, APC.
“Now, the government in power, the NNPP decided to go the Court of Appeal and this morning, the powers of God, the court of appeal affirmed the judgement of the lower court. And by so doing, our gubernatorial candidate Dr. Nasiru Gawuna is the duly elected Governor of Kano State.
“But in all, probably they will go to the Supreme Court which is part of democracy. There is nothing wrong for them to go to the Supreme Court. We too, we are ready to meet them in Supreme Court. And Inshallahu, we will win in Supreme Court as well.
“But, we want to assure the people of Kano State that the good administration that was provided in my eight years of administration, my deputy Dr. Nasiru Gawuna and now, the Governor-elect for Kano state will provide not even similar, I believe he will provide a better administration and more achievements will be recorded in Kano State. Because that is what we expect.”
On his part, Gawuna, who spoke after Ganduje, said he was overwhelmed with pleasure, and while thanking God for the victory, he pledged not to fail the people of Kano if he assumes office.
“Ahadulahi, whoever goes to the court like this, and was given judgement in his favour, definitely feel very happy and grateful to Allah for the Court of Appeal to affirm his victory. “And I am so happy; yet I am still deep in my thoughts because I have to sit down and think very well. But because of the confidence and expectations of the people on us, Inshallahu we are praying that we are not going to fail our people”, Gawuna said.
