A former Vice President of Nigeria and presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the 2019 presidential election, Atiku Abubakar, has finally reacted to insinuations about his Cameroonian citizenship.
DAILY NIGERIAN reports that Mr Atiku was born in Jada in 1946, in present day Adamawa state, but then part of Northern Cameroon.
But, at the presidential election tribunal, the All Progressives Congress, APC, had alleged that Mr Atiku was a Cameroonian by birth and thus not qualified to contest the election of 23 February, 2019.
In his response to the All Progressives Congress filed before the Presidential election tribunal, Mr Atiku said he was born by Nigerian parents and therefore ‘a citizen of Nigeria by birth”.
According to him, father, Garba Atiku Abdulkadir, was a Nigerian by birth who hailed from Wurmo in present day Sokoto State, while the mother, Aisha Kande was also a Nigerian who hailed from Dutse in present day Jigawa State.
“The parents of the 1st Petitioner (Atiku) are both Fulani, a community/tribe indigenous to Nigeria”, his lawyers said.
“The birth of the 1st Petitioner in Jada, in present-day Adamawa State of Nigeria was occasioned by the movement of his paternal grandfather called Atiku who was an itinerant trader, from Wurmo in present day Sokoto State to Jada in the company of his friend, Ardo Usman.
“That in Jada, Atiku, the grandfather of the 1st Petitioner gave birth to Garba who in tum gave birth to the 1st Petitioner and named him after his own father Atiku.
“The 1st Petitioner’s mother, Aisha Kande was the grand-daughter of Inuwa Dutse who came to Jada as an itinerant trader too from Dutse in present day Jigawa State.
“That all averments concerning Germany, British Cameroons, League of Nations and Plebiscite are false and misleading in relation to the 1st Petitioner and therefore completely irrelevant more so that the 1st Petitioner is a Nigerian by birth within the contemplation of the Constitution of the Federal Republic ofNigeria, 1999 (as amended).
“The averments in the aforesaid paragraphs are indeed fabricated, contrived, made in bad faith and designed to embarrass the 1st Petitioner.”
