The Arewa Youth Consultative Forum (AYCF) says Nasir el-Rufai, Kaduna state governor, is “playing with fire”.

The group said this in response to the arrest warrant which the Kaduna state government obtained for the arrest of members of the group which gave quit notice to Igbo in the north.

The group had since withdrawn their threat.

In an interview with The SUN,  Shettima Yerima, president of the forum,  said el-Rufai was trying to distract the group by bringing up a matter that had been forgotten.

“Honestly, we really do not want to join issues with him, what is before us is how to rebuild the country, and so far, we have been doing that. Probably the governor is working to distract the government and we cannot be an agent to distracting the government,” he was quoted to have said.

“We will ensure we do everything within our limits to ensure that there is peace in the country, and we have been demonstrating this. We will not allow him to distract us.

“We are wondering because el-Rufai never thought of this until few days before October 1, when the issue has been put behind us, and we have done wonderfully to nip in the bud any crisis that would arise in the north because of killings in the southeast.

“We took it upon ourselves to go to Kano, a volatile area to address the northern youths, and warned that nobody should attack any Igbo in the region; more so, there shouldn’t be any reprisal attack. No one from southeast was harassed in the north. For him to come now is a clear indication for Nigerians to know the true enemy of the government, as well as, true enemy of the country.

“What he is doing it to incite people against the government and he is playing with fire. That is exactly what he is demonstrating because there is peace in the land, and we are working to ensure that there is unity.

 About two weeks ago, we have conference of all the ethnic nationalities, where we resolved to work together in order to build a stable country as a panacea to having peace and progress, and to support the good policies of the government, and suddenly, el-rufai is coming up with this issue, after all the efforts we have been making to ensure peace.”