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Yusuf to Ganduje: Get ready for me! Your rotten image, a disgrace to Kano
Abba Kabir Yusuf, Governor of Kano State, on Sunday, fired back at Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, his predecessor in office, asking him to brace up to answer to his numerous sins during his eight years in office, where he practically plundered the state and destroyed its image through his numerous acts of massive corruption.
Yusuf, who emerged governor on the platform of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), founded by Rabiu Kwankwaso, Ganduje’s predecessor, has not hidden his anger over how the former governor allegedly ran the state, had mounted an onslaught against some of the outcomes, including demolishing some of the buildings allegedly belonging to him.
The NNPP governor, recently upped the ante, when he indicated his interest to drag the former governor, currently the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to court on account of corruption and to recover some of the state’s resources he was accused of pillaging.
But Ganduje, in laughing off the move, accused the governor of indolence in a statement by Edwin Olofu, his spokesman, accusing him (Yusuf) of shifting public glare from the fact that there was nothing on ground in the state to justify the sharp increase in its statutory allocations since the inception of the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration.
“Rather than join issues with my traducers in Kano over the trumped-up charges levelled against me, I would implore them to redirect their energies towards easing the plights of our people in Kano. They still have the opportunity to revert to my blueprint for the sustainable growth and development of Kano State. It is not yet late in the day for them to emulate my developmental strides. They can still salvage the situation as my tenure was devoid of any wrongdoings., Ganduje had said in the statement.
But in a swift riposte through Sanusi Bature Dawakin Tofa, his own spokesperson, Yusuf, accused Ganduje of dodging the issue, saying the former governor’s recourse to “shamelessly” referring to non-existent failure of the government of the NNPP, instead of facing the nemesis of corruption and political violence hanging around his neck, was in bad taste.
Describing Ganduje’s eight-year tenure represented failure and maladministration, following massive records of corruption, diversion pf public funds and sale of government properties that characterised it, Yusuf insisted that the APC boss presided over two unproductive tenures characterised with siphoning public resources, inability to cater for the needs of Kano’s population, nepotism and bloodshed that left many families the mood of melancholy.
“Our eight months in office has remarkably outweighed Ganduje’s eight wasted years of political caricature and maladministration by all standards,” he said, advising the former governor to buckle up in defence of his “battered image” which he said had brought shame and disgrace to the good people of Kano,” at the court, instead of further exposing his impunity on the media space.
Insisting that no amount of media campaign would hinder the process of bringing him (Ganduje) to book on the glaring cases of corruption filed against him, he said: “We wish to reaffirm the present administration’s resolve and readiness to make Ganduje and his co-travellers face the full wrath of the law for their intentional wrong doing.”
Claiming that his government, was prioritising on socio-economic and physical infrastructure developments for the overall well-being of the state and the people, said he believed that for anyone to assume that efforts to unravel the issue of corruption charges against Ganduje and members of his immediate family was an attempt to cover up, clearly meant, such category of people were either under false illusion or being economical with the truth.
Dismissing the allegations against him of poor governance despite the increase in federal allocation, Governor, he maintained that his administration was still “struggling to recover from state of bankruptcy Ganduje plunged the state in the last eight years,” adding that it was also glaring that Ganduje’s administration was associated with massive corruption, nepotism and intimidation of innocent citizens of Kano state, hence the reason for setting up two Judicial Commission of Inquiry.”
Justice Muhammad Nuraddeen Bello of High Court sitting in Sokoto State has sentenced three men, including a foreign national, to death by hanging, after convicting them on charges bordering on terrorism and arms proliferation.
The convicts, Yusuf Muhammad (alias Sallau), a Nigerien; Jabbi Alhaji Yalle; and Kabiru Muhammad, were apprehended on 13th June, 2025, by the Department of State Services (DSS) Counter Terrorism Unit in connection with cross-border criminal activities bordering on arms trafficking and terrorism.
Bello, who found all three defendants guilty as charged and sentenced them to death by hanging, while also ordering the forfeiture of all monetary exhibits recovered from the convicts to the Federal Government, said: “The conviction is the latest in a series of successful prosecutions by the DSS in its sustained operations against terrorism and organised cross-border criminal networks across Nigeria.”
The sentencing is coming about two weeks after the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja sentenced each of the five suspects arrested on May 31, 2026, by the DSS for their involvement in the November 21, 2025, attack on St Mary’s Catholic School, Papiri, Niger State, to 25 years’ imprisonment.
Justice Binta Nyako, had handed down the judgment after the men, including two Nigeriens, pleaded guilty to all four terrorism-related charges, bordering on support for the commission of an act of terrorism, breaching both Section 16 of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022, and the Firearms Act, were pressed against them.
According to Count One, the men were accused of jointly conspiring to assist a terrorist by agreeing and intentionally playing various roles towards conveying 15 AK 103 rifles as well as about 1,434 rounds of 7.62mm live ammunition from the Diffa region, Republic of Niger, to one Malam Ahmad, a member of the Boko Haram terrorist group based in Borgu, Niger State, and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 26(1) of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022.
Primate Elijah Ayodele, is on the verge of coughing out a whopping N10billion, if he fails to offer unrestrained apology to Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, former Governor of Kano State within the next 24 hours, and retract his claim that the former Minister of Defence is bidding his time to betray Peter Obi, to whom he is to contest the 2027 presidential election as a running mate.
Without doing so, the controversial cleric, should be ready for a major court battle with the vice-presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), the platform on which the pair is to contest the election.
In a letter indicating a legal action against Ayodele of the INRI Evangelical Spiritual Church over defamatory remarks, Kwankwaso, through Magaji Mato Ibrahim, SAN & Co., his lawyers demanded an immediate retraction and apology from the cleric over the allegations.
Details of the letter, dated June 11, and unveiled through the X platform of the legal team, was based on a viral video recorded during a live-streamed church service, where the preacher made allegations targeting Kwankwaso’s integrity as Peter Obi’s running mate under the NDC.
Quoting the cleric as stating: “KWANKWASO IS A FAKE TO OBI, KWANKWASO WILL BETRAY YOU. KWANKWASO HAS BEEN PAID TO BE VICE PRESIDENT TO OBI AMONG OTHER LIBELOUS COMMENTS WHILE PRETENDING TO BE A PREACHER,” the former governor said the comments were unprovoked, grossly unfounded, and carefully designed to create a rift within the ranks of the political party and its supporters.
Handing Ayodele a 24-hour ultimatum to publish a full and unequivocal retraction across all social media platforms and news outlets with the same prominence as the original video, they also demanded a written undertaking that he would cease and desist from making any further malicious statements against their client, warning that failure to comply, would lead to full legal actions.
The letter stated: “We shall claim substantial damages to the tune of Ten Billion Naira and cost of the action on a full indemnity basis amongst other reliefs.”
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Tuesday demanded the immediate end to the exportation of minerals from countries in Africa in their raw forms, which he said had led to massive exploitation of the continent.
The President, told member countries of the African Minerals Strategy Group (AMSG), a forum of Ministers in charge of Mining and Solid Minerals on the continent to speak with one voice to promote, collective interests, ensure value addition, and prevent the continent from becoming merely a source of raw materials for the rest of the world.
As the Grand Patron of the group, chaired by Dele Alake, Nigeria’s Minister of Solid Minerals Development, gave the charge while receiving a delegation of AMSG in the State House, Tinubu told the delegation that the group had a critical role to play in strengthening Africa’s bargaining power in the global mineral market and ensuring that the continent derives maximum value from its natural resources.
His words: “ What we should do is avoid bureaucracy and deceit; we must put an end to exploitation. The rest of the world won’t mind if your country is a cesspit of dams and rubbish and excavates your raw materials without giving value.
“It is our responsibility to collaborate and cooperate to ensure that these metals and minerals bring value to us, bring technology to us, and we can do it. It is how much each country will put into the research, development and refinery. I don’t see reasons we cannot demand centralisation of that conversation somewhere on the continent. So why not utilise that in our research and development and knowledge-based economy to enhance the quality of life and bring prosperity to our people.”
Emphasising that Africa possessed enormous mineral wealth that should be strategically harnessed to drive industrialisation, create jobs and accelerate economic transformation across the continent, the President, said the era of exporting raw minerals without local processing and beneficiation must give way to a new model that encourages investment in local industries, technology transfer and the development of value chains that retain wealth within Africa.
Alake, who had earlier expressed gratitude to the President for his exemplary leadership under the Renewed Hope Agenda, said the gesture had shown support for Nigeria’s mineral sector, especially in the local value-addition and economic diversification drive, where artisanal miners are empowered.
He told the President: “You encouraged us to look at the focal point of the establishment of this group, which is to ensure that the African natural resources, especially with regards to minerals, critical matters, are localised, the beneficiation coming directly to Africans generally.
“You charged us that we should set our sails very high and ensure that local value addition is a pivot around which all the objectives of this organisation should revolve.
“So, sir, we have gone implemented your charge and we are quitted that today local value addition is reverberating all over Africa.”
He added that some member countries have gone ahead to ban the export of raw minerals.
He explained members of the body were in Abuja for the Fifth edition of the African Natural Resources and Energy Investment Summit (AFNIS 2026), to push for a new continental approach to resource management and industrial development.
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