Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kadun State was at the Aso Rock Villa on Friday for a closed door meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari and also to dispel rumours he was involved in an accident and in coma.
He also used the opportunity to react to the claims of presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the recently held presidential election, Atiku Abubakar, that he won the polls.
Addressing State House Correspondents after the meeting, the governor maintained that he was never involved in an accident insisting that at the time he was alleged to have been in an accident, he was in an aircraft to another country.
He called on Nigerians to be mindful of how they use the social media to avoid advancing the cause of the enemies of the country.
“I came to see Mr President after my re-election as governor because immediately after the election I took a break. I came back to report to him that I was not involved in an accident; I am alive, I am not in a coma.
“I also discussed other issues related to my state.
“My advice to everyone in Nigeria is to avoid forwarding stories that have not been verified.
“Social media provide platforms for disseminating information but they are also platforms for dissemination of lies and hatred.
“We should be very careful that we don’t use these platforms to advance the cause of the enemies of this country.
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“I was never involved in any accident; I was not near any accident. In fact, at a time I was supposed to be involved in an accident, I was in an aircraft going to another country.
“But, somebody sat and concocted this story and we are trying to trace who started it. Criminal proceedings can be initiated against the person,” he said.
On the claim by Atiku that he won the presidential election, including winning in Kaduna, the governor said: “Well, I heard about that. Initially, I thought it was a joke and when I checked I saw clearly that he said he won Kaduna. It must be in his dreams.
“Let me say this without any fear of contradiction; since President Buhari started contesting for the presidency in 2003, he has never lost Kaduna.
“So, PDP has never won elections in Kaduna from 2003, even with a sitting governor in 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015. It has never happened. I don’t know what will happen that Atiku will win Kaduna in the elections this time.
“He lost Kaduna, he lost very badly, even though about 100,000 votes he claimed to have got were added because elections were conducted without card reader in some parts of the state, that’s how he even got up to the 400,000 that he got.”
El-Rufai also dismissed Atiku’s claim that the result of the presidential election on INEC’s server showed him as winner of the presidential election.
He said: “Well, I don’t know about INEC server, it must be Atiku’s server. I don’t know about INEC server, we don’t know how they had access to it, they will tell us during the tribunal proceedings what is this server and how they got access to it and how they got their numbers.
“You do not go to court in an election petition by quoting INEC server or any other server. Anyone can create a server, I can go and buy it, it is a piece of equipment and call it INEC server.
“But that does not mean that it amounts to anything, we are guided by the electoral act and the evidence act and other enabling legislation and he has to prove his case.
“But anyone can make claims – we live in the age of fake news and fake claims. Anyone can make claims but you have to prove it.’’
Recall that the Atiku had claimed in his state-to-state computation that he won the presidential election in Kaduna and some other states which INEC declared were won by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Also, contrary to claims by el-Rufai that the PDP had never won the presidential election in Kaduna, official results released by the INEC in the 2003 presidential election showed that the PDP candidate then, Olusegun Obasanjo won Kaduna State with a margin of 154,893 votes having polled 1,025,347 votes to defeat Muhammadu Buhari of the All Nigeria Peoples Party, who polled 870,454 votes.
