Four years after Muhammadu Sanusi II was deposed as the Emir of Kano, Governor Abba Yusuf of Kano State has reinstated him to the throne.
“With the full support of the kingmakers, I have approved the reappointment of Malam Sanusi Lamido,” the governor said to cheers at the Art Chamber of the Kano State Government House around 5:16 pm on Thursday.
Emir Sanusi II, a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, was known as Lamido Sanusi before becoming king.
Governor Yusuf reinstated him right after signing the Kano State Emirate Council (Repeal) Bill 2024 into law.
The new law replaces the Kano State Emirates Council Law, 2019, and dissolves the emirate councils created by Governor Yusuf’s predecessor Abdullahi Ganduje.
It was that law that Ganduje used to split the Kano Emirate into five in December 2019 and deposed the 14th Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II on March 9, 2020. The emirates created by the Ganduje administration were Karaye, Bichi, Rano, and Gaya, in addition to Kano.
The decision generated controversy back then, and in reversing it, Governor Yusuf said it was the reversal of a law “that balkanised the over 1,000-year-old Kano Emirate”.
Based on the new law, the governor gave the emirs that held sway at the dissolved emirates 48 hours to vacate their palaces.
The Deputy Governor of Kano State, Aminu Abdussalam, and the Speaker of the Assembly, Jibril Falgore, were present for the signing of the bill into law and for the announcement.
Before signing the bill, the governor and both men met with traditional rulers and kingmakers behind closed doors.
Emir Muhammadu Sanusi II began his reign on June 8, 2014, when Rabiu Kwankwaso was Governor of Kano State. He was appointed Emir less than four months after his removal as Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria by Goodluck Jonathan, the President at the time.
He had fallen out with Jonathan after accusing his administration of corruption five years into his tenure as Central Bank Governor.
A similar scenario would play out in his reign in Kano under the administration of Ganduje with things under control until three years into his reign.
In 2017, Governor Ganduje and Sanusi II reportedly disagreed with the latter’s critical comments about the state government’s handling of the state’s finances. Sanusi had accused the government of mismanagement and corruption, particularly about the state’s debts.
The disagreement between the two escalated in 2019, and the Kano State government created four additional emirates, reducing the powers of the emir.