Kanti Bello, former Katsina senator, is dead

Kanti Bello, the lawmaker who represented Katsina north senatorial between 2003 and 2011, is dead. 

Mohammed Isa, one of Bello’s former aides, disclosed this to TheCable on Tuesday but did not go into details.

Bello was known to be outspoken on the floor of the senate, even though by the middle of his second term in the legislative chamber, he was among senators who had not solely sponsored any private bill.

In an interview he granted in June, Bello came down hard on the government of President Muhammadu Buhari, who is from his state.

He accused the current administration of not doing enough to revive the economy and also alleged that the Buhari government was selective in its anti-graft war.

“You see, every generation has to face some challenges and our challenge now in this country is the economy,” he had said.

“It isn’t a question of Buhari coming to fight insecurity; it isn’t corruption anymore, because you can only be corrupt when there is something to eat.

“Yes, it still thrives because nothing is going on and there is an allegation that it is thriving under Buhari, only people that they dislike are being arrested.

“Let me give you a typical example. Even this fight against corruption, it seems to be one-sided. They said they arrested a former governor of Sokoto State, Attahiru Bafarawa, because he collected N100 million campaign money, but the same campaign money, I was made to understand, was collected by Tony Anenih and he wasn’t arrested.

“Is Anenih’s own different from that of Bafarawa? I don’t like anything that looks sectional and we are going to look for a Nigerian with no vendetta at all that wants to serve this country.”

A graduate of the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria in Kaduna state, Bello was born in 1945.