As the 2023 election gathers steam, elder statesman Tanko Yakassai, has said political exigency made Bola Tinubu, presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), to choose Senator Kashim Shettima as his running mate.
POLITICS NIGERIA reports that Tinubu recently picked a former Governor of Borno State, Shettima, a fellow Muslim, as his running mate.
Groups including the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) had faulted the party and its candidate.
Commenting on the issue, Yakassai told Vanguard in an interview published on Tuesday that a Southern Muslim/Northern Christian ticket cannot win presidential poll in Nigeria.
“When you come to talk of elections, my experience is that it’s the Christians who are raising this issue today, not Muslims.
“There are many states in Nigeria in the North and in the South where you have a Christian Governor and a Christian deputy. Nobody has ever raised issue with that. Now that this is becoming a problem, it is because of the mischief of certain individuals or their shortsightedness. If they didn’t do it wouldn’t be a problem today,” he said.
Meanwhile, Tinubu has rescheduled the presentation of his running mate for Wednesday.
Shettima will be officially unveiled by 1.00pm at the Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Centre in Abuja.
