Your Excellency, @atiku , whilst I acknowledge that it is within your constitutional right to change political Parties at anytime you may wish, however, releasing your letter of resignation from the PDP during this week of the mourning of our immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari, is clearly an attempt to draw the spotlight away from such a solemn occasion and direct it on yourself. In fact (as the image below shows) you prepared, typed, signed and delivered that letter the morning after the passing away of the former President was announced. With the greatest respect to you, this clearly demonstrates that your obsession with your perennial Presidential ambition knows no sympathy or empathy.
And since we are on the issue of your letter, it is both morally and legally wrong to continue to use the
Coat of Arms of the Federal Government in your private or political communications when you stopped being a functionary of the Federal Government more than 18 years ago. Section 6 of the Flag and Coat of Arms Act, Cap. F30, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004 makes this an offence.Morally, it is also reprehensible to use a symbol suggesting that you are acting on behalf of the authority which that symbol represents. It borders on impersonation. Imagine a situation where all former Government functionaries continue to use the Coat of Arms of Nigeria in their personal, political or private communications. There would certainly be confusion everywhere.
I have a bounden duty both as a Cabinet member and a member of the Inner Bar to protect our laws and constitution.
Please, be well guided.
https://x.com/fkeyamo/status/1945536929140732180?t=XK9k4fZqT712AVphe4WUFA&s=19
Atiku's aide replies
Dear Mr. @fkeyamo
Ordinarily, your latest sanctimonious outburst would not deserve a response. But since you’ve taken it upon yourself to play the unsolicited role of moral compass in a government drowning in contradictions, it is only fair to set the record straight—if not for your sake, then for the benefit of the Nigerian public.
Let us begin with the obvious: you serve in an administration where a senior official, your colleague @aonanuga1956, had the moral indecency to publicly excoriate former President Muhammadu Buhari barely hours after his death was announced. His statement—published before Buhari’s body even touched Nigerian soil—was a scathing attack laced with bile and revisionism. Yet we did not hear your voice. You neither condemned the insensitivity nor reminded your colleague of “sympathy or empathy.” Where was your so-called bounden duty then?
But suddenly, Atiku Abubakar’s resignation letter from the PDP—which he had every right to make public in response to false claims about his political future—has become your moral crisis. The same Atiku who honoured Buhari with a dignified tribute, even when people in your circle chose to desecrate his memory with political venom.
Spare us the hypocrisy.
Your desperate attempt to deflect public attention from the rot within the APC, and the internal decay within your own government, is transparent. Nigerians are mourning not just a former President, but also the steady collapse of governance, civility, and coherence under your watch.
On the issue of the Coat of Arms: Atiku Abubakar is a former Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The use of a ceremonial letterhead bearing the Coat of Arms on a formal letter of resignation is not an impersonation—it is a nod to the office he once held, much like former U.S. Presidents retain their presidential seals for formal communications. There is no confusion there—only the confusion of a man eager to pick a fight where none exists.
And if your obsession with technicalities was matched by even half the commitment to rule of law, perhaps we would not have witnessed the daily desecration of our courts, the assault on press freedom, or the economic asphyxiation of Nigerians under the Tinubu administration.
In closing, the real tragedy is not Atiku Abubakar’s letter—it is your government’s failure to provide Nigerians with dignity, direction, or hope. If your silence over Bayo Onanuga’s desecration of Buhari’s legacy is anything to go by, you have no moral standing to lecture anyone on decorum or timing.
Please, be well guided—by principle, not by partisanship.
Phrank Shaibu,
SA on Public Communication to Atiku Abubakar
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