APC 2019: All 342 Kano delegates for Buhari, Kwankwaso gets nothing- Ganduje 

Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje of Kano state has said that the state has the highest number of delegates in the All Progressives Congress (APC) that would determine who gets the presidential ticket of the party in the 2019 general elections.

In an exclusive interview with Blueprint newspaper in Abuja, Ganduje said all the 342 delegates in the state would vote for President Muhamadu Buhari if he decides to run for a second term in office.

Ganduje said it would be a great mistake if his predecessor, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, runs against the President for the APC ticket like he did in 2015, saying that he would get zero vote from the state.

“Kano state has a total of 342 delegates. We have the highest number of delegates in Nigeria in APC. No state is up to 300 delegates, and I can assure you if Kwankwaso contests against Buhari in APC, he will get zero vote from Kano,” he said.

Ganduje also spoke on the financial status of the state, saying that the internally-generated revenue has been improved from the N1 billion monthly by the previous administrations to N4 billion monthly.

He said the state government pays salaries and entitlements of workers and pensioners as and when due, adding that contractor handling projects in the state are also being paid their dues.

He said: “When we came, we had to reform the old system. I had to request all the staff of the State Board of Internal Revenue to go back to the Office of the Head of Civil Service. We employed a consultant, advertised, and then we took the best brains, some of them not even from the state.

“When we took over, we were getting less than N1 billion a month, but because of our reforms and interventions, we now get over N4 billion every month. It is not up to what we are expecting because up till now those that are supposed to be paying tax are yet to be fully captured in our revenue net.

“You know some people don’t want to pay tax, so we are deploying a lot of advocacy to capture them on our revenue net. The reason people don’t want to pay taxes is that they assumed their money is being embezzled.

“Yes, the increase in our IGR made it possible for us to embark on a lot of capital projects. We virtually use what we are getting from Abuja to pay salaries. So, all are capital projects in Kano state are being funded from the revenue generated from taxes and that is why we label each project thus: “This project is being funded with tax payers money.” This of course is encouraging people to pay taxes.”

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