President Bola Tinubu allegedly rejected Nasir El-Rufai’s nomination as minister due to concerns over his increasing political toxicity, according to former Senator Shehu Sani.
Sani, who represented Kaduna Central in the 8th Senate, alleged in a widely circulated statement on Monday that Tinubu’s decision was influenced by El-Rufai’s contentious political profile and poor security record during his tenure.
“President Tinubu denied El-Rufai a ministerial position because he had become too toxic to be in the cabinet,” Sani stated.
Sani, a longtime critic of the former governor, argued that El-Rufai’s leadership was marked by a significant decline in security in Kaduna State, with banditry and communal violence becoming rampant.
He further stated that El-Rufai lacked the moral authority to criticise the Tinubu administration, citing his own eight-year tenure as governor of Kaduna State as the worst in the state’s history.
Sani characterized El-Rufai’s recent political statements as toxic, saying the former governor contributed to promoting hunger and insecurity in the country.
Sani stated that the government, in which El-Rufai and Amaechi held positions, was responsible for perpetuating hunger and insecurity.
“El-Rufai is the patriarch of banditry and the godfather of insecurity in Northern Nigeria.
He was too toxic to work in Tinubu’s administration; hence, he suffered exclusion, the basis for which he is launching verbal attacks against the current administration.
“El-Rufai’s attacks on Tinubu are an expression of anger over exclusion and a failed sense of entitlement,” he stated.
The ex-lawmaker who recently left the PDP for the APC also alleged that El-Rufai was using poverty as a weapon by dismissing thousands of civil servants and demolishing the homes of low-income individuals, including retirees struggling to make ends meet.
