Former Kaduna State Governor, Malam Nasir El-Rufai, has revealed that he sought the approval and prayers of former President Muhammadu Buhari before leaving the All Progressives Congress to join the Social Democratic Party.
El-Rufai made the disclosure during an interview with the BBC Hausa Service, monitored by our correspondent in Kaduna on Thursday. According to him, he never makes major political decisions without consulting Buhari.
He said, “The APC has derailed; the party is no longer abiding by its founding principles. Everyone is working for himself, looking for money. The government is commercialised; everything has a price tag.”
He lamented that party loyalists who worked for the APC’s success were sidelined instead of being rewarded.
“Justice has been kept at bay, those who worked for the party were ignored instead of being compensated. If there is any position or appointment, they give it to a Lagos boy, etc.”
El-Rufai said his disillusionment with the APC led him to consult Pastor Tunde Bakare, who had introduced him to the party in the first place.
“That is why we’ve been speaking. We spoke, we said this is not the party we know. The party is dead. I said the only option is for me to meet Pastor Tunde Bakare, because he dragged me into APC. He took me to Buhari. I did not join the APC because of Buhari; it was Pastor Bakare who dragged me to APC, and courtesy demands I should let him know.”
He also informed Buhari of his decision to leave the APC and received his blessings.
“Buhari too, I told him I was leaving the party; I sought his blessings and prayers. He said he has given me his blessings and prayers. We are the ones in politics; he (Buhari) is now father of the land and has been praying for us, so what remains?”
El-Rufai further declared that he had publicly renounced his APC membership, criticising those in control of the party.
“I’ve publicly denounced my membership of the party. They can go and hold on to the party, they can eat the party alone like food, we’ve given up.”
When asked whether he left the party to avoid being expelled, El-Rufai insisted that he was the one abandoned by the APC.
“That would’ve been much easier for me, but look at it, as I kept on saying, I did not leave the party, it’s the party that dumped me. Why did it leave me? First of all, I was marginalised, not involved in all party activities. Not that I was invited and refused to honour the invite, I was completely sidelined.”
He alleged that the APC had deviated from its original plans and was not implementing the policies they had envisioned when they formed the government.
“Secondly, what we had planned to implement when we formed government, it’s not what’s being implemented,” he said.
Addressing widespread claims that he left the party because he was not considered for a ministerial appointment, El-Rufai dismissed the assertion as a misleading narrative.
“But did I even look for the ministerial position? I know those who even paid money to be appointed as ministers.”
He recalled how President Bola Tinubu personally appealed to him to serve in his cabinet, particularly to address Nigeria’s power sector crisis.
“Yes, I was at the screening because the President begged me. It was in the public glare, not the two of us for him to say he had never begged me. It was in Kaduna where he begged me to come and work with him. Even then, I did not agree until when we sat down and he told me what he wanted.”
According to El-Rufai, Tinubu had expressed a strong desire to resolve Nigeria’s electricity challenges and wanted him to spearhead the effort.
“That the problem of electricity had refused to allow the country to progress. He said he would like to be the President that would finally resolve the power problem and he begged me to come and help him achieve that. I told him that I would look at the challenge he gave me and would consider working with him. I thought he meant it.”
