Former Governor of Zamfara State, Abdul Aziz Yari and Senator Kabiru Marafa have defected to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Zamfara state PDP chairman, Bala Mande, while addressing journalists at the end of a stakeholders’ meeting in Gusau on Sunday said aside from Yari and Marafa, other top-ranking APC members have also joined the party with their supporters, and only a formal welcome into the party’s fold remains.
Mande said, “We want to officially announce to you of the joining of our great party, the PDP, by the former Governor, His Excellency, Alhaji Abdul Aziz Yari, Senator Kabiru Garba Mafara and their supporters.
“They are now PDP members, we have reached an agreement and we are going to implement the agreement.
“We have agreed to work together as one political entity in one party, the PDP for the success of the party in the State.
“We have also agreed to work extra hard to reclaim the lost mandate of Zamfara State in 2023 and save its people from their present predicament.
“I have given the stakeholders a complete update of where we are as a result of this development.”
Marafa represented Zamfara Central in the 7th and 8th Senate from 2011 to 2019. In 2018, he ran for the governorship nomination of the ruling All Progressives Congress but lost because of an internal crisis in the party.
Yari who governed the North-West state between 2011 to 2019 aspired to be the national chairman of the APC but stepped down for Senator Abdullahi Adamu, the prefered candidate of President Muhammadu Buhari.
