By Nicholas Ojo
The spokesperson of the Atiku Abubakar presidential campaign team, Dino Melaye, says it’s uncivil for Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State to blame Atiku Abubakar for the armed Fulani attacks on the people of Benue.
Melaye also says Ortom is entitled to support any candidate of his choice in the 2023 general elections.
Ortom had recently rejected Atiku’s presidential bid, saying: “To hell with Atiku and anyone supporting him. They should go and tell him. You want me to be a slave for a Fulani. It is better that I die. Anybody supporting Atiku is an enemy of Benue.”
During an AriseTV interview on Tuesday, Melaye had said: “Ortom is entitled by right to support whichever candidate he wants; it’s not proper to place the blame of what is happening in Benue on Atiku; it is not fair.Â
“During the Shagari administration, he appointed four Benue indigenes as ministers, also the late Yar’Adua appointed a Benue indigene as AGF. These two presidents were Fulani by ethnicity, yet they appointed Benue citizens.
“It’s uncivil to blame Fulani activities on Atiku, this is not right and not proper.
“In February this year, Atiku donated N50 million to IDPs; he shows love to the people of the state. Benue is a second home to Atiku.”
Benue Governor Ortom had kicked against the Fulani invasion and massacre of some residents of the state, saying he could not be slave to another Fulani man in the person of Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of Ortom’s political party, PDP.
Ortom spoke late on Sunday when he hosted his colleagues from Rivers, Oyo, Abia and Enugu States to a dinner party held at the Government House, Makurdi.
Ortom said he would not support Atiku’s presidential bid to continue the killing of Benue people.
The governor lamented the killing of 18 persons in his council area last Friday, where a young man in his 20s had his eyes removed to send a message to him.
Ortom condemned some Benue sons, particularly those at the National Assembly, who, according to him, are keeping mum over the killings going on in the state, saying, “From tomorrow, I’m turning my venom on the National Assembly members from the state who are romancing with Buhari to kill the Benue people.”
Atiku had drawn the ire of Ortom after he said the governor should stop stigmatising and scapegoating an entire Fulani ethnicity over the killings in his state.
Ortom is one of five PDP governors diametrically opposed to Atiku’s presidential bid.