Claims by Senate President Bukola Saraki that President Muhammadu Buhari hates Kwara State has been faulted by a political group, Ilorin Emirate for Buhari (IEB).

Saraki had on Tuesday in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital, attributed his defection to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, from the ruling All Progressive Congress, APC, to alleged hatred Buhari has for the state saying the loathing informed alleged passing over for juicy federal government’s appointments of the state’s indigenes.

“We discussed this issue last week when I came home. You told me that you were tired of the APC, but I asked you to exercise patience. I told you that I will seek God’s guidance and feed you back on my return to Ilorin.

“The Federal Government appointed over 200 persons into juicy offices without allotting any slot to me or Dogara. Everything went to Katsina, Katsina, Lagos, Lagos. If not for the love I have for Nigeria, we would have scattered everything. They don’t want us in their party. They don’t like us in Kwara.

“What I am after is for my people to enjoy dividend of democracy. I want us to be in the party that will love my people. Wherever we are, we will win elections. The governor told me he’s tired of the APC,” he told his supporters.

Reacting to the Senate President’s remark, Ilorin Emirate for Buhari via a statement released by its Director of Publicity, Mr. Rotimi Sulyman, the group tore into Saraki over his claim that the Buhari led-federal government disliked Kwara State and did not consider her people worthy of juicy appointments.

The statement read, “Our attention has been drawn to snide bile spewed by Senate President at President Muhammadu Buhari. Saraki’s remark posed more questions than it answered. Does it mean, a decision about Kwara and her people in any part of the world cannot be made without deferring to the Senate President, who as a matter of fact before 2003 when he left defunct Societe Generale, a bank his family sacrificed for personal comfort for politics, had never stayed in the state for a week at a stretch.

“We admit that he is a tin god in some quarters in the state but he should not continue to insult our collective intelligence as we are all not a group of shallow wusses. For him to have thought that appointment slots for the state must be allotted to him for onward distribution to his goons speaks volume of his disrespect for a state, which produced the first northern lawyer, the first national newspaper editor from the north among other feats. Our consolation is in the expression. ‘Arrogance comes before fall.’

“President Muhammadu Buhari is enamoured of Kwara and the demonstration of his love for the state is there for everyone to see. If anything, and without a shadow of doubt, it is Saraki, who hates Kwara and her people with every fiber of his being. He appropriates our common patrimony to himself, and with Gov. Abdufattah Ahmed led-government he put in place invited outsiders to partake in the pillage.

“In several instances where he was at liberty to influence the appointment of Kwarans he passed them over at the altar of friendship. To mention but a few: in the cases of the state owned-companies, Harmony Holdings, Shonga Farms Limited and Kwara Small and Medium Enterprises he went for an Ogun State indigene, Tope Daramola, Bayo Sangibiyi from Oyo State and Segun Soewu of Ogun respectively as the companies’ heads.”