Zamfara PDP chairmen disown Shinkafi on defection

Chairmen of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 14 local government areas of Zamfara State said yesterday that they did not follow a former governor of the state, Alhaji Mahmuda Aliyu Shinkafi, to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

Shinkafi had along with his former aides, including the Chief of Staff, Secretary to the State Government (SSG), ex commissioners and his running mate during the 2015 general elections, announced their formal defection to the APC on Sunday.

At the occasion, Shinkafi announced that all PDP chairmen in the 14 local government areas of the state have also joined the defection train, and told the gathering that he had asked them to go to their respective wards and receive APC membership cards.

But in another twist yesterday, the PDP chairmen in the local governments dissociated themselves from the defection, saying that Shinkafi was on his own.

The leader of PDP Chairmen Forum in the state, Alhaji Shuaibu Isah Mafara, who doubles as the party’s chairman in Talata Mafara Local Government Area, said they had no prior knowledge of Shinkafi’s defection.

Mafara, who spoke with Daily Trust shortly after a stakeholders’ meeting at the residence of the state chairman of the party, Alhaji Hassan Muhammad Nasiha, described Shinkafi’s claim that they were with him as deceitful.