The Borno State governor, Kashim Shettima, has said that holding elections in the troubled North-East states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe is not a privilege but a right.
Shettima said this on Sunday in an interview with newsmen shortly after the inaugural meeting of the North-East Presidential Campaign Council of the All Progressives Congress, which held at the Zaranda Hotel, Bauchi.
The governor said, “When people talk about not holding elections in this part of the country, it is not a privilege but a right that we should participate in the elections as contained in the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and in the electoral act.
“At least somebody will declare us as citizens of Nigeria. It is not a partisan issue nor is it a favour but it is our right.”
Shettima pointed out that there was no basis for disenfranchising any Nigerian from exercising his or her constitutional right.
The Borno State governor, who is also the North-East Zonal Coordinator of the APC Presidential Campaign Council, noted that the insurgency in the three states had destroyed the region.
“The experience of insurgency on the North-East is a very bad and sad one, one that you cannot even wish your enemies,” he said.
He said he was however hopeful that insurgency would soon become a thing of the past in the north.
Source: Punch
