From: Sylvanus Viashima, Jalingo
Major stakeholders of the All Progressive Congress (APC), in Taraba State, has disowned the Minister of Women Affairs, Hajia Aisha Alhassan, over remarks about her loyalty to a former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
The Taraba APC Integrity Group, at a press briefing in Jalingo, in reaction to recent public endorsement of former vice president Atiku Abubakar for the 2019 presidency and declaration that her loyalty was not with President Muhammadu Buhari, said the minister was on her own.
The press statement, read by the spokesman of the group, Mr. Aaron Artimas, described her utterances as “irritating and thoroughly scandalous,” and said her behaviour was “insolent as it not only ridiculed the presidency but has become an anti thesis for our dear state”.
Artimas said that Alhassan was a Nigerian who entitled to her opinion and has the right to support whoever she chooses to “but her current disposition as Minister of the federal republic representing Taraba State precludes her from expressing or canvassing such a position without slightest consultation with her constituents in the state she parades herself as the party leader”.
He said that the major stakeholders of the party in the state have been speaking against Alhassan’s stranglehold on the party, using her influence to intimidate and exert undue pressure on the hapless executive of the party in the state.
The statement said that the timing was wrong, and the action disrespectful and demonstration of total lack of sympathy for the President who has just returned from medical treatment.
The group expressed concern that the statement was capable of ” rubbing off on the image of the APC government and creating the false impression about discordant voices withing the party in the support of the president.
“In view of the foregoing, the APC Integrity Group including the teaming members of the party in Taraba state hereby dissociates ourselves from the actions of the Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Sen. Aisha Alhassan. We condemn in strongest terms the attempt to draw our party into this inappropriate and unnecessary controversy.
“We in the state are not only grateful to the President for placing our dear state on his top priority list, as demonstrated by the approval of the Mambilla Hydro Power project but also assure the President of our total support and loyalty”.