A northern-based human rights and pro-democracy group, the Coalition for Democratic Norms, has cautioned the Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, against his frequent attacks on President Muhammadu Buhari and his focussed government to avoid unexpected repercussion.
The group sounded the note of warning in a statement jointly signed by Balla Abbe Kazaure and Usman Dan Numa Gazkiya, the National Coordinator and General Secretary respectively.
According to the statement, Emir Sanusi, going by his position, must have had several open channels to get to the Presidency to ventilate his ideas on the economy than attacking the seat of power openly and frivolously.
The group wondered whether the Emir has learnt any lesson from history that whoever lives in a glass house should not throw stone, asserting : “No emirship has the capacity to defend any glass house when the act of throwing stones at the government boomerangs.
“Though everybody has the right to advice or criticise the government, it is not when such a person is also vulnerable.”
Going down the memory lane, the group wrote: “As it is, the position of an emir is too vulnerable to guarantee the comfort of public commentary, especially making a career out of acerbic take on government policies.
“Powerful traditional rulers like Sultan Dasuki and Emir Jokolo were all stripped of their titles in ONE day; no processes, nothing. That’s how ‘useless’ the traditional authority is in our present arrangement.
“Emir Sanusi’s own grandfather was only casually invited to Kaduna in 1963. On arriving the governor’s office, Sir Kashim Ibrahim drew out a prepared letter of resignation alongside the report of DJM Muffet report of inquiry into Kano Native Authority finances, he was advised to sign the letter. He did.
“He went into the office as an emir with all the paraphernalia and emerged out of it as a ‘retired’ emir. He was immediately exiled to Azare, in present day Bauchi state.”
Emir Sanusi was reminded in the statement that “he was the CBN governor only recently.
“If the government wants, it could get proverbially a thousand and one things to use against him.”
The concerned group cited issues of the Financial Reporting Council report, Forex management under him as well as bailout for banks as examples.
CODEM added: “It is like the case of someone in the glass house and the emirship can’t fortify that glass house.”