Mallam Saliu Mustapha, a governorship aspirant of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kwara, has pledged support to the party’s decision to adopt direct primaries in picking candidates for the forthcoming elections in the state.
Mustapha said this while answering questions from newsmen on his arrival at Ilorin International Airport on Sunday.
He said that as a team player, all he desired for the state was the best and would therefore support any method adopted by the party leadership to select the party’s flag-bearer.
Mustapha, an ally of President Muhammadu Buhari and former Deputy National Chairman of the defunct Congress for Progressives Change (CPC), was received by a huge crowd of supporters.
The gubernatorial aspirant arrived in Ilorin after he obtained and submitted his expression of interest as well as nomination forms at the national secretariat of the party in Abuja.
Mustapha told newsmen that his coming into the race for the coveted seat in the state was a call to service and ensure that the state was lifted from the decay it had found itself.
He, therefore, advocated partnership with all progressive minded people in the party for the state to be pushed to the next level.
The governorship hopeful urged the people of the state to support his aspiration to govern the state with a view to delivering on what had been lacking in the state over the years.
“For me, whatever the leadership of the party has decided to adopt, we would go by it because as team players, all we want is the best for the state. We want to see a situation where Kwara would be lifted from the decadence or decay that it has found itself.
“It is about bringing the state to the next level. It is about putting all hands on deck, partnering fellow progressives to see that we take Kwara to the next level. Any process, any method, we are comfortable with it. For me, it is about call to service, to serve our people and to make life better for them.
“We would want to appeal to Kwarans to give us the necessary support to be able to give them the best APC has to offer. My major appeal is that Kwarans should give us that opportunity to serve them and to be able to deliver what they have been lacking for a long time,” Mustapha said.
He also added that he would support all efforts aimed at fixing the state from “its dilapidated situation”.
“We are going out into the field to canvass, campaign and to let our people know what we have for them, why we have come out to aspire for this job and why we want to fix the state from the dilapidated situation it has found itself,” Mustapha added.
The state chapter of the APC, led by Bashiru Bolarinwa, had earlier spoken of its decision to adopt direct primary in the selection of the governorship candidate of the party. (NAN)
