APC Governors and the National Working Committee of the party have cut down the number of aspirants for today’s presidential primary to five. They are all from the South.
The remaining 17 contenders were advised to step down.
Those who got the nod of the governors and party leaders to remain in the race are former Lagos Governor, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu; a former Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi; Ekiti State Governor, Kayode Fayemi; Ebonyi State Governor, David Umahi and Vice President, Prof Yemi Osinbajo, SAN.
Plateau State Governor and Chairman of the Northern Governors Forum, Simon Lalong disclosed this on Tuesday during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily, saying the APC is looking at the possibility of a consensus candidate.
“From our own recommendations, as of this morning, we recommended five people. In alphabetical order, we said Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, John Kayode Fayemi, David Umahi and Professor Yemi Osinbajo. Those are the ones we made recommendations and we said we should put them forward,” he stated.
“Consensus is possible. Right from yesterday up till today, we have been doing consultations like Mr President said, ‘I give you the opportunity, work on it.’
“The governors and the National Working Committee will continue on that consensus. As of yesterday, we were able to even reduce, made recommendations of about five persons, from 23 to recommendations of about 13 aspirants without disqualifying anybody.”
“Within that 13 aspirants that were graded by the Screening Committee, we now looked at it and then recommended, that was jointly done by the Progressive governors and members of the National Working Committee, reducing it to five.”
Lalong’s comments come a day after the APC’s NWC as well as the 19 northern governors insisted on the emergence of a southerner as Nigeria’s next President.
APC National Organising Secretary, Suleiman Argungu, had made this known on Monday while addressing reporters at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja, the nation’s capital.
While briefing reporters in the company of some members of the NWC, he explained that the committee took the decision following a meeting of its members.
According to Argungu, the NWC stands with the position of the northern governors elected on the APC platform for power to shift to the southern part of the country when President Muhammadu Buhari completes his eight-year two terms billed to lapse in May 2023.
He made the remarks amid reports by several media outfits that a presidential hopeful and Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, had emerged as the party’s consensus candidate for the forthcoming poll.
