Following the Appeal Court verdict, sacking Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf, the Kano State Police Command on Monday said the command has uncovered some groups plotting to unleash violence on the state.
According to Usaini Gumel, the State Police Commissioner, Usaini Gumel, while speaking to newsmen, the command had arrested seven suspects, and they would soon be charged in court, adding that some faceless groups who claim to be traders are gathering at some points of the state, including some local government areas, assuring that the command is on top of the situation.
He said, “Intelligence reports at our disposal show that these so-called traders are using religion to perpetuate their acts.
“Some patriotic Nigerians came to us from Bebeji, Wudil and some other areas, reporting that some people are hiding under the guise of reading the Quran in the names of prayers, and already we have sent our men and dispersed them,” he said.
Gumel expressed worry that the groups were trying to stir emotions against the police by speculating that they harassed women while dispersing them.
“These faceless groups are planning to send negative messages through the social media and traditional media against the Police, and they are putting pressure to achieve their bad intentions,” he added.
The Informant247 had, on November 17, reported how the appellate court sacked Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf of Kano State while upholding the verdict of the tribunal led by Justice Oluyemi Akintan Osadebay, which sacked Yusuf on September 20, 2023.
The lower court had declared 165,663 votes of Yusuf, who contested under the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP), invalid because they were not signed or stamped by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), whereas the governor’s votes were reduced to 853,939 while those of Nasir Ganuwa, his All Progressives Congress (APC) rival, remained at 890,705.
Yusuf had rejected the tribunal verdict, which he described as “unfair” and “a miscarriage of justice”, and headed to the appeal court.
Wole Olanipekun, SAN, the lead counsel for Yusuf, at the court, asked that the tribunal’s judgement be set aside.
Kicking against the ruling on ballot papers, the senior lawyer said that was the first time in history that a tribunal would annul an election over non-signing of the back of ballot papers, arguing further that that was the first time that a political party would file a matter without joining its candidate as a party in the petition and the candidate would declare the winner of the polls.
But Akin Olujimi SAN, counsel for APC, countered him, saying the Appeal Court stated emphatically that the non-signing of ballots amounted to electoral malpractice.
