Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriation, Ahmed Mohammed Maccido, yesterday, asked Hon. Bitrus Kaze (PDP, Plateau) to immediately apologise to the Sultan of Sokoto. He also warned him not to denigrate the office and person of the Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III. Maccido’s warning stemmed from Kaze’s condemnation of the Sultan over his call for amnesty for the Boko Haram sect.
Hon. Kaze had faulted the Sultan’s plea for amnesty.
He had said such call for amnesty showed the level of high-calibre support Boko Haram enjoyed in the North.
But Maccido, a prince of Sokoto has, however, warned Kaze to either retract the statement or apologise personally to the Sultan.
Maccido insisted that Kaze should quickly retrace his steps as the Caplihate views his statement as a personal attack on the Sultan.
“I have no problem with what the Sultan has said because if you look at it, this is not a statement made by the Sultan alone; it’s an agreed statement; unanimously agreed upon by a certain group of people in the northern part of this country. He sat with emirs, he sat with ulamas and at the end of it, they deliberated on it and discussed and concluded and agreed that, yes, it is the right thing to do.”He came out and aired it as his view.
“So, I don’t really have a problem with that. But my problem is the fact that somebody, an individual, who has, of course, the right to say what he wants to say as a Nigerian said he disagreed with the Sultan in totality; that is his right as a Nigerian.”
“But to come out later in the same statement to say that, that goes to show that Boko Haram is being sponsored by people in high places (means) he’s tying the Sultan to Boko Haram; implying that the Sultan is one of the sponsors of Boko Haram.
“I don’t agree with him and he should be very careful with what he says.”As far as I’m concerned, that statement is mischievous because Hon Bitrus Kaze should not be speaking to the Sultan in such a manner. The Sultan of Sokoto is not his age mate; he should not come out and say that the Sultan is one of the sponsors of Boko Haram because that is what is implied in that statement.”I disagree with him and I’m telling him in strong words that he should either retract his words or he should apologise in person to the Sultan because this is personal. I would also repeat it that he should be careful with his statement.”
“Last week, the Sultan appealed to President Goodluck Jonathan to grant total amnesty to the Boko Haram sect, much in line with the same gesture granted armed militants in the Niger Delta area.”The President promptly rejected the plea on the grounds that amnesty cannot be granted to a faceless group.”
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