- Tinubu visits Oyo, Ogun, gets delegates’ backing
- It’s time to reward me, says ex-governor
Ondo State Governor Rotimi Akeredolu gave tips yesterday to the All Progressives Congress (APC) on how it can hold on to the Presidency after next year’s general election.
In a post on his Facebook page, he said: “APC must work to retain power. We must rotate power to retain power. Rotate to the South. Shikena (a Hausa word for final)”.
The governor, who was named the chairman of the party’s Convention Security and Compliance sub-committee, has consistently advocated a power shift.
Governors of Southern states at three meetings insisted that power should shift to the South after President Muhammadu Buhari’s tenure.
On Wednesday, Cross River State Governor Ben Ayade, while hosting frontline APC presidential aspirant Asiwaju Bola Tinubu in Calabar, said: “Zoning is a provision of our constitution to ensure balancing. It should not be about ethnic or regional domination but balancing. It’s the turn of Southern Nigeria in 2023.”
Ayade is also a presidential aspirant in the APC.
Yesterday, Tinubu visited Oyo and Ogun states to canvass support from delegates.
In Abeokuta, Tinubu told Ogun delegates to vote for him at the convention as a reward for backing people for political offices in the last 26 years.
He said it was not out of place to declare that the time had come for him to reap the benefits of supporting others.
The former Lagos State governor advised the delegates against jettisoning sound judgment and track records at the convention by turning it into a “family affair”.
In attendance were: Governor Dapo Abiodun, former governor Segun Osoba, Senator Olamilekan Solomon Adeola, State Chairman Yemi Sanusi and Deputy Governor Noimot Salako-Oyedele.
Tinubu was accompanied by governors Abdulahi Ganduje (Kano), Babajide Sanwo-Olu (Lagos), Lagos State House of Assembly Speaker Mudashiru Obasa, Senator Kashim Shetima, Senator Dayo Adeyeye and former Minister of Communications Adebayo Shittu.
He said his erstwhile political platform – the Action Congress (AC) was yielded to former Vice President Atiku Abubakar to contest the 2007 presidential election when he was hounded by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Atiku had been in and out of the PDP since 2007.
Taking all down the memory lane, Tinubu said he never regretted sacrificing the opportunity offered him to serve as running mate to President Muhammad Buhari in the build-up to the 2015 presidential election.
According to him, he declined the offer to enable him to stabilise the APC, particularly towards ensuring that the newcomers from the PDP were fully accommodated.
He said in Yoruba: “It is now over 25 years that I have been helping people into political offices.
“If Governor Dapo Abiodun – seated here – will be faithful to his God, I want to emphatically state that he couldn’t have become the governor without me.
“I am here to solicit your votes. Don’t make it a family affair.
“Since the time we started with the AC, Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and now the APC, this is the first time l want to contest for President.
“This is me telling you between my life and God Almighty, Buhari called me to be his Vice President. He said because the first time he contested, he picked Okadigbo, a flamboyant, catholic, but Nigerians didn’t vote for him.
“The second time, he picked another Igbo, Chief Edwin Ume Ezeoke, Nigerians didn’t vote for him; that if he goes to bring the Pope to run as his vice, Nigerians won’t vote for him, but you Bola Tinubu, you have six governors, you have never lost an election before, come and be my vice.
The Nation
