Aisha Buhari, the wife of President Muhammadu Buhari, has ‘endorsed’ the video of Kaduna Governor Nasir El-Rufai accusing “elements” in the Presidential Villa of working against All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.
El-Rufai who spoke on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme had said the saboteurs in Aso Rock were those whose candidates lost at the party’s presidential primary and are still bitter.
Aisha uploaded the video on Instagram on Wednesday, hours after El-Rufai spoke on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programm.
The President’s wife, who also leads Tinubu’s women campaign train, captioned the post: “#longlivethefederalrepublicofnigeria”.
El-Rufai said the unnamed people are now hiding behind President Buhari to pursue their interests.
“I believe that there are elements in the Villa that want us to lose the election. Because they didn’t get their way they had their candidate and he didn’t win the primary and they hiding behind the President desire to do what is right.”
They are trying to get us to lose the election, and they are hiding behind the president’s desire to do what he thinks is right. I will give two examples: this petroleum subsidy, which is costing the country trillions of Naira, was something that we all agreed would be removed.
“In fact, I had a discussion with the president and showed him why it had to go. Because how can you have a capital budget of N200b for federal roads and then spend N2 Trillion on petroleum subsidy? This was a conversation I had with the president in 2021 when the subsidy thing started rising. He was convinced. We left. It changed. Everyone in the government agreed, and it changed.
“The second example I will give is this currency redesign. You have to understand the president. People are blaming the Governor of the Central Bank for the currency redesign, but No. You have to go back and look at the first outing of Buhari as president. He did this; the Buhari, Idiagbon regime changed our currency and did it in secrecy with a view to catching those that are stashing away illicit funds. It is a very good intention. The president has his right. But doing it at this time within the allotted time does not make any political or economic sense.”
El-Rufai’s bombshell is coming a week after the ruling party’s presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu said there were plans to stop him from winning the election following the fuel hike and new naira scarcity that rock the country.
Recall that Tinubu had said fuel scarcity and naira redesign were targeted at him.