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Tag: Ali Modu Sheriff

  • PDP lures Ribadu, Sheriff for chairmanship seat

    PDP lures Ribadu, Sheriff for chairmanship seat

    Key stakeholders in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have extended invitation to a former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Nuhu Ribadu, to contest the party’s chairmanship position.

    All on the cards is a former governor of Borno State, Ali Modu Sheriff, as possible replacement for Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu who resigned his position as national chairman of the party in May 2015.

    Already, a handful of aspirants had earlier notified the party leadership of their interest in the race. The list includes Wilberfoce Juta, Saidu Kumo, Lawan Girgiri and Shehu Gabam.

    Addressing journalists  shortly after a meeting, which was said to have lasted close to midnight on Monday, the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, said after due consideration, the meeting decided to expend the contestants’ list.

    According to Metuh, the party’s two governors in the Northeast – Governors Ibrahim Dankwabo (Gombe) and Darius Ishaku (Taraba) had submitted five candidates for the party to pick from.

    The position has been zoned to the Northeast to give a sense of fairness to the zone that produced Mu’azu.

    A court in Abuja had, in November 2015, ordered the party’s Acting National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, to step down within 14 days and directed that the position be filled by a candidate from the Northeast.

    Secondus was to act for a period pending the emergence of a substantive chairman of Northeast extraction.

     

  • PDP govs move to impose Modu Sherrif as Chairman

    PDP govs move to impose Modu Sherrif as Chairman

    Some People’s Democratic Party (PDP) governors are reportedly moving to impose former Borno State governor, Ali Modu Sherrif on the party as National Chairman of the party.

    Among those behind the move are Governors Ayo Fayose, Segun Mimiko and Seriake Dickson.

    The Board of Trustees members have opposed the move and canvassed support for Wilberfore Juta.

    A meeting of the party’s BOT on Tuesday in Abuja was inconclusive. The issue has thus been referred to the National Executive Council (NEC) of the party which is about to meet Tuesday evening in Abuja.

    If no consensus is reached both Juta and Sheriff will have to face an election on Thursday.

  • Boko Haram: DSS defends Sheriff

    Boko Haram: DSS defends Sheriff

    •Agency indicts Australian negotiator, others

    THE Department of State Security (DSS) said yesterday that it had uncovered plots by certain persons to implicate the former Borno State Governor, Ali Modu Sheriff, with the view to portraying him as a Boko Haram sponsor.

    The DSS accused Australian hostage negotiator, Dr. Steven Davis, of acting with the said suspects in the bungled ceasefire talks between the Federal Government and the sect.

    Its spokesperson, Marilyn Ogar, paraded seven suspects in Abuja,  for allegedly conniving with Davis to “make merchandise” of the Boko Haram insurgency through “concocted and fabricated” stories.

    The suspects are: Junaid Idrissa Khadi, Abubakar Yusuf (aka Baba Sani), Saleh Alhaji Ibrahim (Liman Ibrahim), Abdullahi Saleh (aka Babadale), Nurudeen Ibrahim, Mubarak Adamu (aka Molo) and Mustapha Maidugu (aka Musty or Small).

    Ogar said: “It is necessary to state here that Davis and his cohorts are among several other local and international groups, who are out to make merchandise of the Boko Haram insurgency through concocted and fabricated stories.

    “These subversive campaigns are also aimed at permeating and shaping political discourse as well as challenge the integrity of our national security and stir discontent among Nigerians and our esteemed allies in the war against terror.”

    According to the spokesperson, the discovery was as a result of investigation on the activities of the Australian negotiator in the Boko Haram saga, particularly his claims regarding the identities of sponsors of the sect.

    Davis had, a few months ago, insisted that Sheriff and the immediate past Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Azubuike Ihejirika, were some of the sponsors of the dreaded sect.

    Ogar continued: “Recall that on 29th August, 2014, one Steven Davis, an Australian self-styled negotiator for the Boko Haram sect had alleged that Ali Modu Sheriff (senator) and Azubuike Ihejirika (Lt.Gen/rtd), former Governor of Borno State and former Chief of Army Staff (COAS) respectively were among chief sponsors of the Boko Haram sect.

    “Davis premised his ‘findings’ on discussions with several field commanders of the sect, who allegedly expressed willingness of the sect to negotiate with the Federal Government if Davis would spearhead such dialogue. To buttress this, he posted a photograph of himself taken in 2013 with some alleged sect members.

    “Based on the allegation, this Service initiated an in-depth-investigation into the matter. Consequently, seven associates of Davis were arrested and it has been established that they were part of a well-orchestrated plan to spread falsehood, undermine and discredit efforts of government to end terrorism”.

    The DSS alleged that the suspects had confessed to conspiring with Davis to implicate Sheriff, with monetary inducements of various sums.

    Ogar also said the suspects claimed that Davis single-handedly “conjured” the indictment on Ihejirika, based on allegations that the military under the former COAS was responsible for his several failed attempts to make contact with the Presidency.

    The DSS also accused the Australian of assembling the suspects and presenting them to government negotiators as Boko Haram commanders, adding that the suspects also, at various times, posed with Davis on You Tube as some of the sect’s commanders.

    This, Ogar said, was aimed at misleading the Federal Government and compelling it to negotiate with the “fraudulent group”.

    Vowing to take appropriate action against the suspects, the DSS said: “We want to reiterate once more, that this Service is committed to bringing to justice all who sponsor or partake in the publication of subversive reports against this country. We shall not rest on our oars until our country is rid of all unwholesome activities”.

    But Isa Gusau, the media associate to Governor Kashim Shettima, in a statement yesterday, claimed that one of that paraded suspects, Khadi, was first appointed by Sheriff in 2010 and he was retained by Shettima in 2011 on Sheriff’s request

    The statement said the state government was compelled to respond based on enquiries by the media following the parade of Khadi by the DSS.

     

    Gusau said: “While it is not the tradition of Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno State to join issues with security agencies as he holds each of them in high esteem, we are concerned about an insinuation concerning the status of Khadi, who was presented as an aide to Shettima. We don’t want to question the integrity of the security agency involved and hence cannot outrightly allege political motive to bring Shettima’s image to disrepute.

    “First, let it be noted that our clarification here is not intended to pronounce Khadi guilty of whatever reasons that led to his arrest. The clarification is simply to put the records in their proper perspective.

    “Khadi was a Special Adviser to Shettima following his appointment in 2013 on the insistence of ex-Governor Ali Modu Sheriff, who at that time, had the listening ears of his successor, Governor Shettima.

    “It is important to note that Governor Kashim Shettima never found Khadi with any questionable character as at the time he was appointed. If at all Khadi had any questionable character, such can only be best known by those he first associated with before Shettima became a Governor in 2011 or perhaps, those that persistently recommended him to Shettima for reappointment.”

    The statement called on the security agency to accord the fairest hearing to Khadi, “as it should to every other Nigerian arrested for whatever reason.”

     

  • I left APC to help Borno – Sheriff

    I left APC to help Borno – Sheriff

    Former governor of Borno State, Ali Modu Sheriff, on Tuesday explained why he dumped the All Progressives Congress for the Peoples Democratic Party.

    The former governor said the ongoing insecurity in the state and poverty cannot be overcome except the PDP takes over in Borno State.

    He added that his defection to the PDP is to “effect change in governance,” and connect the state to the government at the centre in 2015.

    Sheriff spoke at a news conference in Maiduguri, the state capital.

    He said, “Many of you here today will be asking why I defected from APC to PDP having served two terms as governor on the platforms of defunct APP and ANPP. The answer is simple and straight forward, because Borno State is the least developed in the north, as it has been in the opposition for over two decades.

    “The security challenges we are facing today, that has claimed many lives and property, including my brothers and uncles, cannot be overcome in an opposition political party like APC that I have just defected from into this ruling party. Opposition in the country has never taken out affected states from their abject poverty and dearth or absence of federal presence.

    “Whether you like or not, I am ready to lead my people and join hands to effect a democratically elected government in this state on the platform of PDP. This is the right time for the people to effect change by voting out the ruling APC during the governorship election slated for February 28, 2015.”

    The Minister of State for Power, Mohammed Wakil, in his remarks noted that the PDP in Borno State now has a golden opportunity to defeat incumbent governor – Alhaji Kashim Shettima at next year’s poll.

     

  • Jonathan, Sheriff meet at Aso Rock

    Jonathan, Sheriff meet at Aso Rock

    President Goodluck Jonathan met behind closed doors yesterday with former Borno State Governor Ali Modu Sheriff at the Presidential Villa in Abuja

    Sheriff, who has been fingered as one of the sponsors of the Boko Haram sect, declined to speak with State House correspondents at the end of the over one hour meeting.

    Dressed in a cream-coloured babanriga, Sheriff told reporters: “No time today. I’m going to see the Chief of Staff.”

    Discussions at the meeting were believed not to be unconnected with the activities of Boko Haram in the Northeast.

     

  • Jonathan, Sheriff meet at Aso Rock

    Jonathan, Sheriff meet at Aso Rock

    President Goodluck Jonathan on Monday met behind closed doors with the former Borno State Governor, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff at the Presidential Villa, Abuja

    Sheriff, who has been fingered as one of the sponsors of the violent Islamic sect, Boko Haram, declined to speak with State House correspondents at the end of the over one hour meeting.

    Dressed in a cream coloured ‘Agbada’ Sheriff said to journalists: “No time today. I’m going to see the Chief of Staff.”

    Discussions at the meeting is believed not to be unconnected with the activities of Boko Haram in the North East.

  • DSS, Ihejirika and Boko Haram sponsorship

    DSS, Ihejirika and Boko Haram sponsorship

    WHAT is remarkable about the damning allegations made by the Australian negotiator Stephen Davis against both Ali Modu Sheriff, former Governor of Borno State, and Azubike Ihejirika, former Chief of Army Staff, is not that they were made at all, or whether they were believable or not. It is not even whether Mr Davis himself, who claimed to have met some Boko Haram commanders presumably to negotiate the release of the 219 abducted Chibok schoolgirls, was a self-styled negotiator, as the Department of State Security (DSS) suggested, or a federal government appointed negotiator, as some critics alleged. What is truly astounding is the sweeping defence of Gen Ihejirika by the spokesperson of the DSS, Marylin Ogar, and her frequently hasty characterisation of grave issues and condemnatory conclusions in matters relating to any query raised by the opposition.

    Mr Davis had in late August alleged that both former Governor Sheriff and Gen Ihejirika were sponsors of Boko Haram, an allegation he made on Australian television, and repeated on Arise TV. Ms Ogar conceded that the former governor, who had twice being invited for questioning by the secret service, would be invited again for another round of questioning. Her tone sounded injured, as if it was a great bother to question the former governor again; or as if since he joined the ruling party, it was a deliberate and unnecessary politicking of security matter by the opposition. Describing Mr Davis sneeringly as a ‘self-appointed’ negotiator, Ms Ogar spoke glowingly of the former army chief as a patriot and dismissively of the allegations against him.

    Said Ms Ogar of Gen Ihejirika: “I would want to say here that it is absolutely uncharitable for us as Nigerians to reward somebody who laid his life in pursuing this people  insurgents. He, together with the military, and together with this service succeeded in bringing down activities of insurgents in Kano, Okene and other parts of Nigeria to a halt and pushing them to Sambisa forest. The same man, because he is no longer in service, to say that he is the one that is sponsoring, I think it is wicked. That should not be the way we reward people who laid down their lives to provide a secure environment for us.” Ms Ogar, like many in public service, particularly the security agencies, can obviously not be weaned off their patrician snobbishness, or of their haughty characterization of public service. In their boring opinion, they are our masters, and cannot and must not be questioned. We exist at their pleasure, and they exist at our utter insufferableness.

    What, it may be asked, qualified former governor Sheriff for another round of questioning but exculpates Gen Ihejirika, seeing that both gentlemen were named by Mr Davis in his rather direct and shocking revelations? The DSS was right to have agreed to invite the former governor, though by suggesting they had done it twice already they signposted their reluctance. But they were absolutely and reproachably mistaken to have ruled out questioning Gen Ihejirika, notwithstanding their private opinion of his innocence, let alone going ahead to describe him in the most laudatory terms and describing both Mr Davis and anyone persuaded to think like him as wicked and damned. Gen Ihejirika should have been invited for at least a chat, to show that the DSS is non-partisan and professional.

    There have been some calls for Ms Ogar’s sacking. No one in government will heed the calls. The reason is that she is of course not the problem with the DSS. If the DSS, police and military have become partisan, it is more than anything else a reflection of the systemic rot and bureaucratic decay that have overtaken the country. It will take a deep and revolutionary leader to undo the decades of damage pedantic leaders have inflicted on the country. That change is, sadly, not in sight.

  • Sheriff not on Jonathan’s entourage to Chad, PDP insists

    Sheriff not on Jonathan’s entourage to Chad, PDP insists

    The Peoples Democratic Party has echoed the Presidency’s denial of former Borno State Governor, Ali Modu Sheriff being on President Goodluck Jonathan’s entourage to Chad Republic last week.
    The Department of State Security has said Sheriff is currently under security investigation for his alleged involvement in the sponsorship of the Boko Haram insurgency.
    Sheriff was however pictured with President Jonathan in a convivial mood during a discussion with the Chadian leader on bilateral approach to tackling cross border terrorism.
    The picture,  was posted by the President’s Media Adviser, Dr. Reuben Abati on his twitter account.
    But in a statement on Saturday, the leadership of the PDP insisted that Sheriff was not on the President’s entourage.
    The statement, directed at the opposition All Progressives Congress and signed by PDP’s National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, denounced the APC for criticising Jonathan’s public romance with Sheriff, as depicted in the photograph.
    Describing the opposition’s criticism as “repulsive and utterly despicable”, the PDP accused the APC of sponsoring fabrications in the media about the Jonathan-Sheriff rapport.
    The statement said: “The refusal of the APC to shed its taste for lying, spreading of falsehood and attacks on individuals as means of achieving political control in spite of several counsels by well-meaning Nigerians.
  • Jonathan denies taking Sheriff to Chad

    Jonathan denies taking Sheriff to Chad

    President Goodluck Jonathan on Thursday denied the allegation that he took the former Borno State Governor, Ali Modu Sheriff, to Chad.

    Sherif has been named as one of the sponsors of the Boko Haram sect. He is being investigated in order to know the true position.

    The former governor was spotted with President Jonathan when he held talks with the Chadian President, Idriss Deby, in N’Djamena on Tuesday.

    But briefing State House correspondents, the Special Adviser on Media and Publicity to the President, Dr. Reuben Abati, said that Sheriff was not on the President’s delegation to Chad.

    He said, “We have noted with surprise, the unnecessary hue and cry raised by the All Progressives Congress (APC) and other bigoted critics of the Jonathan administration over the claim that the President is “hobnobbing” with the former governor of Borno State, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, who was recently accused by the Australian, Stephen Davis of being one of the chief sponsors of the terrorist group, Boko Haram.

    “The totally erroneous basis for that charge was the spurious claim that Senator Sheriff accompanied President Jonathan on his recent trip to N’Djamena as a member of his entourage.”

    “Although Senator Sheriff himself has already given the lie to that claim through his Media Adviser, the Presidency wishes to affirm, for the purpose of emphasis, that the former Borno State governor was not on President Jonathan’s delegation to Chad.”

    He went on: “In keeping with President Jonathan’s commitment to transparency and openness in the conduct of government business, names of the key members of his delegation were announced a day before his trip to N’Djamena.

    “They included the National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd), the Minister of Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Dr. Nurudeen Mohammed and the Director-General of National Space Research and Development Agency, Prof. Seidu Mohammed.”

    “As can be easily verified from the complete list of members of the Presidential entourage to Chad which was also circulated on Sunday and never changed, Senator Sheriff’s name was not on it. The only other persons on the list were the President’s aides, security personnel and journalists.

    “The APC and others who rushed to condemn President Jonathan for a non-existent indiscretion would have found, if they took the least trouble to double-check, that there was absolutely no factual basis for their accusation.

    “Those who associate with Senator Sheriff know that he has longstanding interests in Chad and often spends a lot of his time there.

    He explained that Sheriff happened to be in N’Djamena at the time of President Jonathan’s visit and joined other Nigerian residents of the Chadian capital in coming to the airport to welcome their President.

  • APC queries Modu Sheriff’s trip to Chad with Jonathan

    APC queries Modu Sheriff’s trip to Chad with Jonathan

    For taking former Borno State Governor Ali Modu Sheriff on a trip to Chad, President Goodluck Jonathan came under attack yesterday.

    To the All Progressives Congress (APC), Jonathan has shown “a shocking act of indiscretion” by hobnobbing with “an alleged Boko Haram sponsor, who is not known to have been investigated and cleared of the weighty allegation against him.”

    In a statement issued in London yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party wondered what message President Jonathan was sending to his compatriots and indeed to the international community when he took Modu Sheriff along during his Monday visit to Chad to confer with President Idriss Deby on cooperation against terrorism.

    ‘’This action by President Jonathan confirms what the APC has always believed: That the President either knows more than he is willing to admit on the issue of those who are behind the Boko Haram insurgency or he is willing to sacrifice the battle against terrorism on the altar of political expediency. Either way, this action by the President is the height of indiscretion at best, or a palpable exhibition of callousness at worst.

    ‘’It also confirms our fears that Modu Sheriff was planted as a mole in the APC by his friends in high places, who are jittery about the birth of the party and would do anything to destabilise it,’’ it said.

    APC said the President cannot pretend not to be aware of a report sent home by Nigeria’s Defence Adviser in Ndjamena, Chad, in 2011, detailing the suspicious activities of Modu Sheriff in Chad concerning alleged Boko Haram sponsorship and asking the Federal Government to investigate him.

    The party said it therefore beggars belief that President Jonathan will choose to take the same personality along with him to the same Chad on a trip to canvas cooperation against Boko Haram terrorists.

    ‘’If this is a joke, it is one joke taken too far, especially at a time that Nigeria has been losing territories after territories to Boko Haram; at a time that the same Modu Sheriff has been fingered by another source other than the Nigerian Defence Adviser in Chad, and at a time that calls are being made for an independent investigation into the allegation that Modu Sheriff and former Army chief Gen. Azubuike Ihejirika are Boko Haram sponsors.”

    ‘’Or could it be the case of it takes a thief to catch a thief?’’ it queried.

    APC said it was apparent that President Jonathan smuggled Modu Sheriff into his entourage, as the official statement announcing the trip never mentioned that the former Governor of Borno State would accompany the President on the trip, even while the list of those to accompany the President was included in the statement..

    ‘’Nobody in Nigeria would have known of this unholy alliance carried too far if not that the picture of the President, his host and Modu Sheriff surfaced via Twitter, where incredulous Nigerians were wondering what the President was doing with an alleged Boko Haram sponsor at a time the same terrorist group is waging a titanic battle against Nigeria.

    ‘’Therefore, the President owes Nigerians an explanation on why he took Modu Sheriff to Chad, what the President knows about the allegation hanging on the former Governor’s neck concerning Boko Haram sponsorship and why his administration has not handed him (Sheriff) and Ihejirika to the International Criminal Court for investigation and possible prosecution, since it is now obvious that the Administration is unwilling to probe them,’’ the party said.