A governorship aspirant on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Zamfara State in the 2019 election, Alhaji Sagir Hamida, has been killed by gunmen at Rijana, along Kaduna-Abuja highway on Sunday.

The deceased’s elder brother, Kabiru Hamida, stated that Sagir was killed near Abuja while he was returning from the weekend.

Sagir Hamida, an Abuja-based businessman and former director in the federal civil service, aspired for the governorship of Zamfara under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2011 but lost at the party’s primary election.

He later defected to the APC and vied for the governorship position in 2019 but was allegedly short-changed by the former governor Abdulaziz Yari-led APC in the state from where he joined seven other aspirants to form the G-8 which protested and fought the Yari group up to the Supreme Court.

Hamida who returned to the Yari faction of the APC in the state with the defection of the state governor, Alhaji Bello Matawalle, from the PDP to the APC to fight Matawalle’s leadership of the party in the state, a position he held till he was killed.

Also speaking over the development, the Director-General of Media to the governor, Malam Yusuf Idris, told NAN that the governor received the information with shock.

“I can tell you, my principal is still in shock since the news was broken to him that one of the illustrious sons of the state was killed. We shall furnish you on this when we get more details because right now, the governor is in Abuja attending a crucial meeting,” Idris said.