Arewa Group Blasts Hon Datti Over NEF Comments

AISHA ABUBAKAR

The Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, AYCF, has carpeted Rep Member, Hon Garba Datti Muhammad, over what it described as “disparaging comments” against Northern Elders Forum(NEF) and its leader, Professor Ango Abdullahi.

In a media release signed by its National President, Alhaji Yerima Shettima, the group said it was “seriously upset because of the disrespectful manner in which he attacked the personality of Professor Ango and NEF, which is today the most respected group of prominent Northerners telling the truth to power. Professor Ango’s vehicle was once decorated with bullets for standing with and struggling to have Buhari at the top. He escaped death by the whiskers”.

Hon Datti was reported to have said that Professor Ango and other eminent Northerners inside NEF were in disagreement with President Buhari because he (Buhari) “didn’t give them job”, a statement that infuriated prominent Northerners, including the executives of the AYCF.

The group said, “It was infantile of Hon Datti, as a Northerner and lawmaker of the Federal Republic, to stoop so low by indulging in cheap campaign of calumny  against both the NEF and Professor Ango Abdullahi, a former Vice Chancellor of ABU, a Democrat and close associate of late MKO Abiola”.

In the statement, the AYCF also said “the likes of Hon Datti are the ones responsible for the current backwardness of the North by deliberately hiding the truth about our troubles, in the desperation to get into the good books of the Executive arm of Government”.

“By the way, how many motions has he ever raised since his inauguration as Rep Member? How many Bills has he ever initiated as a lawmaker?” the group queried.

The group then declared that “given the way and manner that Hon Datti is overlooking the dire situation that the North is currently facing, he may not even be a Nigerian in reality, but we are doing our checks and soon we will intimate Nigerians on who he is in actual fact”.

AYCF, in the statement, then queried: “By the way, when has Hon Datti become  the spokesman of the Buhari’s Presidency? Why is he even trying to veer into an area he has no business with?”

“We have not seen such a psychopath and reactionary posturing against those telling truth to power and wonder what has come over this lawmaker.”

“Most importantly, how many times has Hon Datti rose on the floor of the Lower Chamber to make a case for the North? Is his selfish attack on Professor Ango and NEF not an indication that he has no idea what contribution to make in the media for getting the North out of the woods? What was the harm in NEF and Professor Ango openly  drawing the attention of those responsible for the North’s safety to the region’s daily bleeding, kidnapping and killings that have become the order of the day?” 

The statement demanded that Hon Datti should withdraw “such unguarded statement against leaders of the region and stop bringing the image of the House of Reps to ridicule by being openly and unjustifiably sycophantic. This is the of kind of brigandage you get from a lawmaker, who is constitutionally empowered to check the excesses of the executive arm but is now turning against the interest of his constituents, by making pretenses that all is well with the North and  the call for action by NEF was unnecessary”.