The governorship campaign organization of Action Democratic Party ADP in Kaduna State has expressed surprised over the removal of its candidate from the Kaduna State gubernatorial debate organized by the Hausa Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC.
Briefing Newsmen on the development in Kaduna, the Director General of the Campaign organization Mr. Ben Kure said the BBC acted in error by alleging that Mallam Sani Sha’aban is not the gubernatorial candidate of the party in Kaduna State.
“The BBC had earlier invited Mallam Sani Sani Shaaban to the debate but a day to the event the same BBC wrote a letter to the ADP Gubernatorial Candidate withdrawing his participation in the debate which does not go down well with the campaign team”.
Mr. Ben Kure explained that they called for the briefing to clear the air to address the controversies surrounding the invitation and later disinvitation extended to their candidate for the BBC Hausa Service Debate for Kaduna gubernatorial candidates.
“We are doing this on behalf of our Action Democratic Party (ADP) Kaduna Gubernatorial candidate, Honourable Sani Mahmood Shaaban. We received an invite on January 15 inviting us for the BBC Hausa Service debate”.
“I later received a letter on January 17, informing me that the invitation to our candidate for the debate that is holding now, has been withdrawn”.
“We were surprised by the content of the letter, which said the ADP candidate for 2023 Kaduna gubernatorial election is Jibrin Yusuf, who was our dummy candidate”.
“We were surprised that BBC is telling us INEC said Honourable Shaaban is not our candidate,” he said.
“INEC has a way of uploading candidates name, it is an ongoing process and we believe it would be done,” he said.
According to him, their candidate is well respected and accepted by the electorate, hence, they are unperturbed by BBC’s action, but had to clarify because of their millions of supporters.
“Our candidate has political sagacity to reach public in the state and by the grace of God, our candidate will win the election coming soon”.
“We want to appeal to our supporters that we are still in the race and would be in Kashim Ibrahim House by 11am when he is sworn in on May 29,” he said.
The Sani Shaban’s Campaign Director General assured that very soon their campaign will kick off in full force.
Also speaking, the Chairman ADP Kaduna Sta Umar Musa alleged that BBC Hausa took the action due to pressure from candidates who are jittery of the popularity of Shaaban.
“Some candidates are jittery of his participation. They are trying to use BBC to discredit him and reduce his popularity.
“Millions of our supporters initially were not interested in the debate but were willing to follow it after they knew Shaaban was invited”.
“They were subsequently disappointed that his name was removed from the debate,” he said.
Cover/Shindong Bala
