The Jama’atu Nasril Islam (JNI) has described as fake a document linking communications minister Isa Pantami to the planned murder of former Kaduna State Governor Patrick Yakowa.
The group also urged security agencies to investigate the alleged plot and the source of the document.
The said document, which first surfaced online in 2010, alleged that in a July 2010 meeting convened by the JNI and presided over by Mr Pantami, there were plots to, among other things, “eliminate” Mr Yakowa.
The secretary-general of the group, Khalid Aliyu, said in a statement Friday that the allegations were “disheartening and disgusting” and wondered how “an assassination plot could be written and kept.”
Mr Aliyu said Mr Pantami was not at any point JNI’s leader both at national or state level.
“What could have necessitated the combination of Bauchi, Plateau, Niger and Kaduna states from different geo political zones in the meeting?” his statement noted.
“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?”
He added that the document was shared by the media to confuse and manipulate an average Nigerian’s mind in order to disrupt the country’s peace.
Nigerians have torn into Mr Pantami, an Islamic cleric, in the past few days after some video and audio recordings of his past incendiary sermons where he espoused extremists views became public.