El-Rufai warns against electoral violence in Kaduna State

Weeks to the 2019 general elections, Kaduna State Governor, Mallam Nasir El Rufai, said his meeting with the nation’s security chiefs in Abuja was in order to ensure a peaceful election in the state and warned those trying to foment election violence to desist.

Speaking at a stakeholders’ meeting at Kafanchan town, in Jema’a Local Government Area yesterday, the governor pointed out that recent intelligence reports indicated that some people want to foment trouble in Southern Kaduna before or during elections.

He said the reports show that the planners want the violence to spread to other parts of the state, because they have sensed defeat in the coming general election.

The governor added: “I have met with the Chief of Defence Staff, General Abayomi Olanisakin, Chief of Army Staff Lt General Tukur Buratai and the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar Adamu, on the issue and they promised to strengthen security in Kaduna State before and during elections.” He noted that the security chiefs assured him that they would deploy new personnel to tackle the security threat and advised parents to warn their children to be of good behavior and avoid carrying weapons on election day.

“Tell your children and wards that the only thing that they should carry with them on election day to the polling unit is their Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs). The police will arrest them if they carry weapons,” he warned.

While stressing that he had met with traditional rulers of Southern Kaduna yesterday to reiterate the warning, the governor, however, enjoined Kaduna people to come out and vote for their preferred candidates, since adequate security would be provided on election day.

According to the governor, election is about voting for one’s preferred party or candidates and therefore there shouldn’t be problems.

“But there are some people who bring ethnicity and religion on the issue,” he said. “In spite of what the government has done for the people of Southern Kaduna, they have vowed not to vote for us because they say that our party is out to Islamize Nigeria.”

The governor explained that the Deputy Governor, Barnabas Bala Bantex, who has been his deputy for close to four years, has not been Islamised, explaining that his administration has executed projects throughout Kaduna State, irrespective of the local governments or senatorial districts that voted for All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2015.

He noted: “Like I always say, after elections, public servants should cease to be partisan. They belong to everybody and so they should be fair to all irrespective of whatever differences. This is what we have been doing since we assumed office.”

The governor, who said that the difference between APC and PDP votes in Southern Kaduna in 2015 was just 12,000 votes, pledged that the coming election will not be easy for the opposition in the area as they assume.The APC campaign train later went to Kafanchan township stadium shortly after the meeting, where the deputy governor and Dr. Hadiza Balarabe, El Rufai’s running mate, addressed supporters.