The Jama’atu Nasril Islam (JNI), top Islamic body, has refuted allegations linking it and Isa Pantami, minister of communications and digital economy, to the death of Patrick Yakowa, ex-governor of Kaduna state.

The JNI said in a statement on Friday that such reports are “disheartening” and “disgusting”, adding that it never held a meeting regarding Yakowa when he was alive.

An unverified document which has gone viral claims the embattled minister allegedly plotted Yakowa’s death when he presided over a JNI meeting in the 2000s.

“The JNI under the leadership of His Eminence Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, CFR, mni, the Sultan of Sokoto and President General of the JNI, was taken aback by the desperation of some disgruntled elements who in their desperate attempt to smear the image of the Minister of Communication and Digital Economy drag the name of the JNI as being part of an alleged plot to assassinate the late Governor Yakowa of Kaduna state,” the organisation said.

“To start with, how could Sheikh Pantami chair a JNI meeting while he was not one of its leaders either at the National or state levels? What could have necessitated the combination of Bauchi, Plateau, Niger and Kaduna states from different geo political zones in the meeting? If Yakowa was vehemently hated by the Muslims and were desperately trying to ‘get rid’ of him. How did he win the 2011 elections in a Muslim dominated state of Kaduna where a Muslim-Muslim ticket recently sailed through? Who voted him in?

“The so-called pieces of minutes shared by the media to further confuse and manipulate an average Nigerian’s mind into believing this orchestrated lie has further confirmed the desperation of the perpetrators. It is very perplexing and heart-rending that minutes of an assassination plot could be written and kept. How disheartening and disgusting!”

More to follow…