Shettima: Fani-Kayode, a Dubious Liar

Michael Olugbode Borno State Governor, Alhaji Kashim Shettima, yesterday described the Director of Media and Publicity of the Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Organisation (PDPPCO), Chief Femi FaniKayode as a dubious liar and a manipulator of facts.

The governor, who had recently been engaging the former aviation minister in a war of words, said he decided to react to Fani-Kayode’s present tirade in other to put the fact right and ensure that Nigerians are not sold a lie that was mischievously conceived and concocted by a mentally immature mind.

Fani-Kayode had on Tuesday in a statement claimed that Shettima came second at the Borno State gubernatorial primary of the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) where Fannami Gubio, who was later slaughtered by suspected men of the Boko Haram sect, emerged the candidate of the party.

The governor said the twisting of the fact was done to cast aspersion on the governor as being the brain behind the murder of the late governorship candidate in order to replace him.

In a statement by his Special Adviser on Media, Mallam Isa Gusau, Shettima said this is perhaps the last time a response would be given to Fani-Kayode so as not to “risk being placed in his category of being physically an adult and mentally an infant.”

The statement read that: “The latest media attack by controversial Chief Femi Fani Kayode issued on Tuesday, March 10, has once again exposed him as the dubious liar that he was, he is and will forever be when he claimed that Governor Shettima became candidate of the ANPP in 2011 after the party’s standard bearer, Fannami Gubio, was killed because Shettima came second at the ANPP governorship primary election that was won by Gubio before he was killed, meaning Shettima stood to benefit from Gubio’s killing.

“For the sake of putting records in proper perspective and in order to expose Kayode’s deliberate falsehood, Shettima did not participate in the primary election that produced Gubio as candidate of the ANPP ahead of the 2011 governorship election in the state. This contradicts Kayode’s statement yesterday giving an impression that Shettima was second at a primary election that was won by Gubio and so he naturally benefited from Gubio’s assassination.

“Of course, the aim is to mischievously link Shettima with Gubio’s killing and this is to support the ongoing propaganda of the former governor of the state, Ali Modu Sheriff and the PDP aligned to him to score cheap point ahead of the April 11, governorship election.”

Gusau in the statement asked: “Could it be that Kayode was handsomely paid to further that propaganda?”

Adding that for the record, “the late Gubio contested the 2011 ANPP governorship primary election with Alhaji Adamu Yuguda Dibal who was the sitting deputy governor of Borno State under Governor Sheriff. The election held in January 2011, inside the Forsham Conference Centre in Maiduguri. Deputy Governor Dibal and Gubio were the only two aspirants that contested that ANPP governorship primary election held at night and Gubio won with 515 votes, while the deputy governor, Dibal got 169 votes, with a total of 709 votes cast by delegates.”

Gusau also said: “Shettima was one of the four ANPP chieftains that openly declared he had no intention to contest the 2011 governorship election, when he was called to speak at an ANPP stakeholders meeting held at the multi-purpose hall of the Government House, Maiduguri, around November in 2011, which was presided over by Sheriff and everyone in Borno knows this. Shettima was not among the first three most likely persons to secure the ANPP governorship ticket either before Gubio’s death of after he was killed.”

He said even before Shettima later surprisingly emerged as the candidate of ANPP in Borno, there were people in the party that were better positioned than him as he was largely seen as a greenhorn politicians who was appointed a commissioner in 2007 from his position as a General Manager in Zenith Bank.