The media aide to Nasir El-Rufai has dismissed latest hypothesis that the previous Kaduna State governor was planning to defect from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to the Social Democratic Occasion (SDP), calling it a 'unhealthy obsession'.
The assertion got here after El-Rufai hosted company for an Iftar dinner on Tuesday, together with Nationwide Safety Advisor (NSA) Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, a fellow APC member, and Shehu Musa Gabam, the nationwide chairman of the opposition SDP get together.
El-Rufai later visited the SDP nationwide secretariat, the place he met Gabam and different get together leaders.
The go to sparked rumors that the APC chief would defect to the SDP.
Nonetheless, El-Rufai's spokesperson, Muyiwa Adekeye, refuted the claims, insisting that the previous governor's go to to the SDP chairman was a social interplay with no hidden political motives.
“Individuals have private histories and relationships that predate their political preferences. It can’t be a mark of civilization to solely have pals inside your political get together,” Adekeye mentioned.
“When folks go to one another or mingle throughout get together traces, it’s as a result of human relationships exist, whatever the political or the partisan.
“El-rufai is a senior member of the APC, one of many signatories of the merger paperwork, and a serious contributor to the demonstrated viability of the get together.”
He additionally identified that Gabam’s presence on the Iftar didn’t give rise to allegations of a doable transfer to the APC.
Adekeye added that the “baseless speculations” about El-Rufai have turn out to be “an trade” that has produced “tons of lies and clickbait” over the previous 18 years.
“That is unlikely to abate anytime quickly, given the continued obsession of suppliers, who enjoy negativity and their tireless indulgence in complicated assumptions with details.”
He cited an earlier instance through which El-Rufai's go to to former presidents to debate his governance research venture was misinterpreted as a political transfer.
Adekeye, nonetheless, famous El-Rufai's open and forthright persona, stating that if he needed to make “any political selections,” it could not be in his character to permit them to be “topic to hypothesis.”
