A former lawmaker representing Kaduna Central at the National Assembly, Senator Shehu Sani, said the North is occupying the backseat in national development because the leaders could not question former President Muhammadu Buhari.
Speaking as a guest on Thursday’s edition of Channels Television’s Politics Today, Senator Sani hinted that the killings, poverty, and out-of-school children in the north would have been nipped in the bud had senators from that region told Buhari the truth.
”Our refusal to speak the truth to the Buhari regime, our refusal to tell him where he is wrong, led the north to where it is today,” he said
He added that the refusal of Northern elites to criticise their own has been the bane of the north, unlike in the Southwest, where people are speaking out against President Bola Tinubu.
Sani revealed that he came under a barrage of criticism from Northern senators when he stood up in the parliament to express his grievances about insecurity and the killings of his people.
He urged Northerners to do away with nepotism and emulate their counterparts from the Southwest by standing for the truth rather than supporting their own blindly.
“When Buhari was the president of this country, many in the north were silent,” Sani said.
“Even when I stood up in the Senate to raise issues about insecurity and the killings of my people, the first serious opposition I faced came from senators from northern Nigeria because at that time they were expected to be quiet and to enable the system to be silent and embrace whatever it is because the president come from your part of the country.
”And any attempt for you to raise objections to the killings, poverty, and out-of-school children’s issues in the north when Buhari was there, you will be reminded that you shouldn’t damage the image of the president since you’re coming from that part of the country.
