APC LEADERS: AKANDE, BUHARI, TINUBU, ATIKU,ONU, GOV AJUMOBI
The
South East may be the loser in ongoing fierce sharing of offices in Nigeria’s
main opposition political party, the All Progressive Congress, APC, if a report
available to this blog is anything to go by.
According
to newspaper reports, some leaders on the party have concluded arrangements to
field former military Head of State, General Muhammadu Buhari and Senator Bola
Tinubu as Presidential and vice presidential candidates of the party.
The
party’s national chairmanship seat speculated to have been preserved for the
South East zone is said to have been secretly allocated to PDP elements in the
party who decamped to the APC.
Five
PDP governors: Rotimi Amaechi(Rivers), Murtala Nyako (Adamawa), Rabiu
Kwankwaso(Kano), Aliyu Wammako(Sokoto), Abdulfatah Ahmed (Kwara) had defected
to the APC last year.
Mr.
Sam Sam Jaja, a PDP decampee and a loyalist of Gov Amaechi is said to have been
tipped for the chairmanship position.
His
chairmanship seat is said to be an appeasement tool for Amaechi, who will be
cajoled to run for the senate and will be made senate president if the APC gets
majority members in the next senate.
According
to the report, a Buhari/Tinubu ticket was informed by the massive votes, which
the pairing of both men could garner for the party during the election.
By
their calculations, Buhari, who remains very popular at the grassroots level in
most parts of the North-West, alongside Tinubu, who is from the south west,
will be banking on estimated 44,848,911 registered voters who accounted for 61%
of total registered voters in the 2011 election.
This is in contrast to the 27,735,678 registered
voters in the North Central, South- South and the South East combined, who
accounted for 39% of total registered voters in the 2011 election.
According to some self styled APC strategists, Tinubu
as Buhari’s running mate will be able to secure the bulk of the 2,942,214 votes
cast for Jonathan in the South West and Edo State in 2011.
Part of the
report indicated “with Buhari and Tinubu as Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates
respectively, our goal is to secure the core north and south west, which are
the most populous sections of the country and can guarantee at least 50% of the
total votes cast in the country during the presidential election.
On the impact of a Muslim- Muslim ticket on the
electorate, especially with the insurgency in the north east, which has
resulted in the deaths of many Christians, the report said the report decided
to forge ahead with the ticket because it is certain that it is a wining formula.
On the reaction of Vice President Atiku Abubabakr who
is believed to be nursing a presidential ambition, an unnamed source was
reported to have said those who formed the merger should be allowed to lead the
party to the coming elections “as no one with deep pockets from
outside can come and grab the party’s ticket”
The APC has been bedevilled with defections of its
members. Yesterday, former military Administrator of Lagos State, Buba Marwa,
decamped to the PDP from the APC, citing high handedness, deceit on the part of
party leaders.
Earlier, a chieftain of the party and former kano
State Governor, Ibrahim Shekarau and his Sokoto State counterpart, Attahiru
Bafarrawa decamped to the APC. They are of the defunct All Nigeria Peoples
Party (ANPP), one of the three parties involved in the merger of the APC.
However, a source in the party said
there is no plan whatsoever to impose the duo on the party as the party is yet
to select anyone for any position.
"Those calculations are numbo- jumbo
concoted by someone in the comfort of his home or wherever. It is not the
position of the party. Some people are just stoking up sentiments and i can say
that the report might have been sponsored by the PDP just to cause disaffection
amongst us. At the moment, we are concerned with the upcoming congress and
national convention where party executives will be elected. The report is false”
the source stated
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