Sokoto Governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, has said the All Progressives Congress (APC) is fighting a noble cause with the aim of transforming the country into a true bastion of democracy, where the interest of the common man is placed above any other consideration.
Speaking at a Two-Day National Conference on the dynamics of democratic practice in Nigeria: 1999-2015, held at the Centre for Democratic Research and Training, Bayero University Kano, Tambuwal stated that each nation practices democracy according to its historical and cultural peculiarities.
He said the people of the country must be constantly carried a long, consulted and their views incorporated.
Governor Tambuwal stressed that power belongs to the people and that elected political office holders are mere caretakers of the estate whose true owners are the people.
He pointed out that it was the right of the people to keep abreast of government policies and programmes and demand explanation for anything they did not understand.
“It is the right of citizens in a democracy to express their views and to make the leaders accountable,” a statement issued in SokotoThursday by Tambuwal’s spokesman, Malam Imam Imam, quoted the former Speaker of the House of Representatives as saying.
According to him, there is no power like peoples power, and that once the people unite behind a cause, there is no problem they cannot surmount.
“Such kind of support that led to the victory of APC in the last election,” he added.
On the American election, Tambuwal stated that the election of Donald Trump was a clear evidence of democratic dynamism.
“What we thought would be the outcome of America’s presidential election wasn’t what we woke up to hear and this has clearly shown to all the level of dynamism inherent in democratic system of government,” he said..
In his remarks, Kano state governor, Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, stressed the need for respect of the indices of genuine democracy in a way citizens of the country would be made to have a sense of belonging, affirming that the two day conference was poised to address knotty issues.
Ganduje, who was represented by his deputy, Professor Hafiz Abubakar, hailed the wisdom and foresight of the conveners of the conference which he said had come at the time the political class is supposed to grasp the rule of the game on ground.
A Tiv cultural organization from Benue State decorated Tambuwal with traditional attires for his promotion of cultural diversity in the country.
