Senator Ahmed Babba Kaita, representing President Muhammadu Buhari’s Katsina North Senatorial District, has dumped the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
His defection has been attributed to political disagreements with state governor, Aminu Bello Masari.
On his part, he said he was parting ways with the party because of a “gradual loss of credibility” in Masari’s administration, and his delay in conducting the local council election.
In a statement his media adviser, Abdulkadir Lawal, the senator also cited refusal of the Masari-led administration to “uphold the basic foundation of democracy” and inability to address insecurity and poverty.
“As a loyal party man and responsive democrat, whose expansive support base in his constituency has remained pivotal to his passion for the reciprocal growth and development of his people, Senator Kaita has followed the recent events in Katsina with keen interest and deep concern.
“Of notable implication among many of these numerous concerns is the gradual loss of credibility in the Governor Masari-led administration, particularly in the avowed refusal to conduct local government elections across the state on time,” he added.
The statement read in part: “The willful refusal of the administration to uphold the basic foundation of democracy has also found expression in the marginalization of critical stakeholders by the state government and the leadership of the party at the state level.
“The recent Congresses at State and ward levels, with no identified genuine pro-government delegates, are clearly a rape of grassroots politicians and genuine party foot-soldiers who were rigged out of open contest.
“The total absence of a level playing field speaks volumes about an already orchestrated decline to antidemocratic principles and challenges every good conscience, including ours. All politics is local
“As an advocate of transparency, accountability and continuous entrenchment of popular will, Senator Kaita cannot afford to continue sharing the tent of undemocratic merchandise clearly being executed against his people by the state government and party leadership.
“A clear stock taking of where Katsina State stands today, is already enough burden on good conscience. Our good people, in their millions, have excused deprivation, poverty, and hunger for too long.
“They have endured the risk to their lives and wellbeing imposed by the incapacity of the state government to tackle insecurity head on.
“They have been denied enough, already, by the state government. We cannot deny them their right of choice.
“The serial denial of the people’s mandate at the recent Congresses among other related developments has finally found expression in our answer to the clarion call of our people to vacate the APC following very wide consultations….
“The decision to join the Peoples’ Democratic Party represents the ideals of representativeness in mandate, goodwill, and an even more determined desire and opportunity to provide succour, comfort and the much-needed dividends of democracy to the people”.
Kaita upgraded to the Senate after representing Kankia/Ingawa/Kusada federal constituency of Katsina on the platform of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) in 2011 in the House of Representatives. Babba Kaita was elected to the 8th Senate in 2018 to fill the vacuum in the senatorial zone following the death of Senator Mustapha Bukar.