A statement issued by the group on Sunday by its spokesperson, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, said it did not endorse Akpabio or any other candidate for Senate Presidency.
The Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) has dissociated itself from a report that it endorsed a former Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Godswill Akpabio, for Senate Presidency.
A statement issued by the group on Sunday by its spokesperson, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, said it did not endorse Akpabio or any other candidate for Senate Presidency.
The statement reads, “The attention of the Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) has been called to reactions over the reported endorsement of Godswill Akpabio for the Senate presidency by a certain group that impersonated as Coalition of Northern Groups.
“The CNG wishes to categorically repudiate any attempts from any quarter to associate it as a group or as individual members with the candidature of any person or with any regional agitation for any National Assembly position.
“The CNG is committed to its ideal of protecting and promoting the interests of the North and northerners without unnecessarily being partisan.
“We therefore in the strongest terms distance ourselves from any such endorsement and condemn the impersonation of our name as mischievous, callous and insane.”
The CNG, therefore, called on the “public to disregard the report and all similar pronouncements by impostors using the name of the Coalition of Northern Groups”.
“We invite the attention of the media to be more prudent with crosschecking of facts particularly where names of individuals and organizations are involved,” the group added.
Earlier on Sunday, there was a report that the Vice President, Nigerian Ethnic Nationalities Youth Leaders Council, Balarabe Rufai, called on Sen. Abdulazeel Yari to sheath his sword and accept the position of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to put forward Akpabio as its consensus candidate for the Senate Presidency.
Rufai, who is the immediate past National Coordinator of CNG, made the call in a statement on Saturday in Abuja.
He called on Yari to respect the position of the APC and its ‘President-elect’, Bola Tinubu regarding the candidate for the Senate Presidency.
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