Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Petroleum (Downstream), Senator Kabiru Garba Marafa (APC, Zamfara), has called on Nigerians across the states to vote for governors who will protect their money, lives, properties and those that will bring in prosperity to the states.
Marafa said this to State House correspondents while fielding questions after a closed-door meeting.
The gubernatorial and state Houses of Assembly elections will hold on March 9, according to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
“The most important thing now is that we have finished the presidential election which a lot of people are united on the candidacy of President Muhammadu Buhari but when it comes to the governorship election, there are a lot of disparities across the states which the president himself has reckoned by his actions.
“So I will urge people to vote for people they trust that can protect their lives and properties; people that will bring about prosperity to them.
“The president has shown that he is a great democrat and we have seen what he did in Ogun State; we have seen what he did in Imo State and so on and so forth. This is to tell you that the president is ushering in a new brand of democracy without bitterness. People should be allowed to make their choice. In fact, if you listen to his comment on ballot-box snatching, which a lot of people made so much noise about, which I think is unnecessary – unless you are one of the ballot box snatchers – I don’t see why you cannot support Mr. President in what he said.
“As a politician, I know the problem of ballot-box snatching; whatever you think you can take about it, I think it should be a welcome idea. People should be discouraged from snatching ballot boxes because it is equivalent of a civilian coup.
“For the gubernatorial, I think people should vote according to their conscience and they should vote for people who will protect their money, people who will protect their lives and properties and people that will bring in prosperity to the state.”
On the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) rejection of the votes from the North including Zamfara State, Marafa said: “I don’t think there is anything to worry about it. If you ask me, I will tell you that I am not even pleased with the votes that came from my state because I believe we could have done much more.
“We have 1.4 million registered voters and we recorded only about 650,000 votes, so what is the big deal about it? If you look at all the states, I think the overall performance is below 60 percent.
“African leaders have congratulated Buhari on his re-election.
“In most of the states, we have more than 80 million registered voters and out of that figures how many voted? In fact, we are supposed to lament because the situation was supposed to be much more than that. “Nigerians are supposed to be more politically aware and they are supposed to turn out in their numbers to vote much more than we have seen. So, I don’t see anything unusual about that.”