A one-time Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential campaign spokesperson, Prince Kassim Afegbua, has rejected attempts by the former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, to pick the 2023 presidential ticket of the party, saying that it goes against the established principles of equity and fairness of the main opposition party.
He made the declaration in a recent statement, sent to POLITICS NIGERIA, where he argued that it is the turn of the south to produce the next president even as he maintained that it is wrong for the former vice president to be a recurrent candidate of the party.
Afegbua noted the emergence of the new PDP national leadership, which he described as promising, adding that the narrative will be complete if the party backs a southern presidential candidate for the forthcoming poll.
He cited age as one of the reasons that President Muhammadu Buhari has been unable to meet the expectations of Nigerians, saying that as one in that age bracket, “it will be Alhaji Atiku Abubakar to continue to express interest in seeking election in the 2023 presidential election having attained the retirement age.”
The former Edo State commissioner added: “He cannot assume the role of a perpetual candidate or professional aspirànt year in, year out, of the party as though the party was established for him alone. It defeats all sense of logic for such an old man to attempt another round of political contestation at a time the general feeling and mood in the country supports a younger Nigerian from the Southern extraction of the country.
“For me, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar should quit his quest for the presidency and support a southern Nigerian candidate in the spirit of fairness, equity and justice, that will assuage the feelings of stakeholders from the Southern part of Nigeria.
“It will be against the run of play and natural justice for any aspirànt of Northern extraction to show interest in the 2023 presidential election within the Peoples’ Democratic Party threshold.
“It will offend national sentiments, emotions and logic for anyone from the North to show such interest given our diversities and heterogeneous political configurations. Given PDP’s doctrine of political power balancing and fairness, it will be against its own unwritten rule to cede the ticket to any Northern aspirànt least of all Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.”
