Fayose chides Buhari over appointment of northerner as NIA DG, Says; “Buhari is unrepentant sectional leader”

Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose has chided President Muhammadu
Buhari over replacement of the sacked National Intelligence Agency
(NIA) Director General, Ambassador Ayo Oke with Ahmed Rufai Abubakar,
a northerner, saying; “The President has further demonstrated to
Nigerians that he is an unrepentant sectional leader, who does not
care about the feelings of people from other parts of the country.”

The governor said; “With the appointment of Ahmed Rufai Abubakar as
the NIA Director General, all heads of security agencies are now
northerners and the question is, is this what those who enshrined
federal character in our constitution envisaged?”

The governor's Special Assistant on public Communications and New
Media, Lere Olayinka, quoted him as saying in a statement issued in
Ado Ekiti on Thursday, that seeing what President Buhari has turned
the country to, the forefathers of Nigeria, who laid the foundation of
the country on equity, justice and fairness will be lamenting wherever
they are now.”

He said; “Ambassador Ayo Oke was removed from office the same day
Babachir Lawal was removed as Secretary to the Government of the
Federation. While Lawal's replacement came from his home State, Oke's
replacement came from the north. That is unacceptable.”

Governor Fayose, who reminded Nigerians of the President Buhari's
directive that the World Bank should shift its focus to the northern
region of Nigeria, maintained that “because of the President's
nepotism, religious bigotry and favouritism, Nigeria is now more
divided than ever before.

He said it remained on record that President of the World Bank Group,
Jim Yong Kim reportedly said that in his very first meeting with
President Buhari, he (Buhari) said specifically that he would like the
World Bank to shift its focus to the northern region of Nigeria.

The governor said “President Buhari has consistently demonstrated that
he is an ethnic champion, a religious bigot and the number one
promoter of disunity in Nigeria. This he has done again with the
appointment of yet another northerner as the NIA Director General.

“Even at a point, the National Chairman of the President's party, the
All Progressives Congress (APC), John Oyegun had to openly fault the
appointments made by the President, saying that as many as three
people were appointed from one ward in a local government in the
north.

“The implication of what the President has done is that, when Security
Council meeting is held today, apart from one or two insignificant
people, those in the meeting will be people from one section of the
country.

“Even para-military agencies are headed by people from President
Buhari's section of the country. This is unfair.”

Reminding Nigerians of his earlier warnings that President Buhari was
operating as a president of the Northern Nigeria only and the the
appointments made by the President negated the principle of federal
character, Governor Fayose said; “Those who argued then that the
President made the appointments on merit should come to the open to
tell Nigerians, especially those from the south that there is no one
that merited appointment as Director General of NIA.

“Like I said before, those politicians, who painted the picture of a
changed President Buhari to Nigerians before the 2015 presidential
election must have seen now that he (Buhari) can never change from an
ethnic champion to a nationalist,” Governor Fayose said.