Former Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai who last week defected from the All-Progressives Congress (APC) to the Social Democratic Party (SDP) is driven by emotion and not by the general well-being of the people, Alhaji Sule Lamido has said.
“We should not fight (President Bola Ahmed) Tinubu just because we are angry at him or seek revenge.
“Leadership should be about prioritising the country’s well-being rather than personal emotions,” Lamido said in an interview aired on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) at the weekend.
Lamido flayed El-Rufai’s call for senior opposition figures to join him in the SDP to fight President Tinubu in 2027.
He said: “With all due respect, how does he expect us in PDP to leave and join another party?
“The PDP that we built is the same party that made him who he is today. How can a grandson claim his grandfather knows nothing?”
Lamido, a founding member of the PDP, said it would be fool-hardy for El-Rufai to think that anyone would want to join him in his new political sojourn simply because he wants President Tinubu defeated in 2027.
Lamido, a one-time foreign affairs minister and two-time governor of Jigawa State has been in politics since the second republic.
In the aborted third republic, he was National Secretary of the SDP, one of the two parties created by former Military President Gen. Ibrahim Babangida and on whose platform the late Bashorun MKO Abiola contested and won the presidential election in 1993, although the election was annulled by the military and he was denied the fruit of his victory.
El-Rufai, after his defection, called on opposition leaders such as former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, former Anambra State Governor Peter Obi, erstwhile Transport Minister Rotimi Amaechi and former Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola to join him in the SDP.
Lamido, a member of the G-34 that metamorphosed into the PDP in 1998, recalled that El-Rufai once declared there were no political elders in Nigeria.
He insisted that he and his allies were the true power brokers.
“But now, he claims he got the counsel of former President Muhammadu Buhari.
“If he truly had the power he once boasted of, why did he have to seek Buhari’s counsel?” Lamido asked.
The former governor stressed that despite PDP’s internal challenges, it remained his political home.
“If PDP is struggling today, it is still the party that nurtured El-Rufai.
“If he claims the PDP is dead, then he must remember that it is the party that gave him his political foundation. ‘’Whatever he has achieved today, PDP made it possible.”
Lamido argued that if he had any intention of leaving PDP, he would have done so in 2014 when APC was formed.
“If I didn’t join APC in 2014 when I was invited, and they left PDP out of anger, why are they now leaving APC? What has APC done to them?” he asked.
He maintained that governance should not be driven by emotions or personal grudges.
“Leadership is about patience, foresight, and working for the peace of the people and the nation.
“If you allow emotions to dictate your decisions, you will never lead objectively.”
Lamido stressed that if anyone’s goal is to unseat President Tinubu, it should not be based on personal grievances but on national interest.
