THE slur cast on Katsina State governor, Aminu Bello Masari, by the National Secretary of Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, Saleh Alhassan, describing him as a ‘drunkard’ seems to have divided the leadership of the association, with the Katsina State chapter on Friday saying the National Secretary ‘is on his own’.
At a press briefing in Katsina Friday afternoon, Hassan Kuraye, Katsina State chairman of Miyetti Allah, said Alhassan “was on his own and didn’t seek for clearance before the interview”.
“We have spoken with the national executive members and they said Saleh Alhassan did not reflect the true stand of the association on the issue,” Kuraye stressed, as he described the National Secretary’s utterances as uncalled for and embarrassing.
While tendering an apology on behalf of the group to the governor by pleading for forgiveness, Kuraye said the National President would lead members of the group’s executive committee to Katsina next week to speak with the governor on the matter.
The National Secretary, some media reported, had called Goveernor Masari “a drunkard and a tired leader for saying majority of those perpetrating in banditry are Fulanis”.
Governor Masari had stated, among other things, in an interview with Channels Television that: “They are the same people like me, who speak the same language like me, who profess the same religious beliefs like me. So, what we have here on ground are bandits; they are not aliens, they are people we know, they are people that have been living with us for 100 of years.”
But at a press briefing Friday afternoon in Katsina, Hassan Kuraye, chairman of the association in the state, said Mr Alhassan “was on his own and didn’t seek for clearance before the interview”.
“We have spoken with the national executive members and they said Saleh Alhassan did not reflect the true stand of the association on the issue,” the local leader of the group in Katsina said.
While describing the utterances of the scribe as uncalled for and embarrassing to the entire Fulani race, Mr Kuraye tendered an apology on behalf of the group to Mr Masari and urged him to forgive and forget the unpalatable comments by the official.
He also said the national president would lead members of the group’s executive committee to Katsina next week to speak with the governor on the matter.
