By Emmanuel Mogbede
The All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council says with the crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the latest bid by former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar to become Nigeria’s president in 2023 has hit the rocks.
Mr Bayo Onanuga Director, Media and Publicity of the council said this in a statement on Friday in Abuja.
He said by the development, Atiku deserved to be pitied as his yet another bid for the country’s presidency was slipping away.
“This is unraveling before our very eyes even before the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) blows the whistle for electioneering campaign, his party, the PDP is in disarray.
“The signs are just too ominous for the Waziri, especially with the report by the Economic Intelligence Unit predicting another trashing for him in the forthcoming polls,” Onanuga said.
This, he said, was after Atiku’s party’s code for power rotation between the North and South was violated and after he grabbed the PDP presidential ticket without a modicum of sensibilities about national ethos.
According to Onanuga, Atiku is now faced with the karma of his inordinate ambition, adding that the PDP has imploded in a battle of attrition, the result of which is predictable.
He said that the ongoing fraticidal war where a faction of the party led by Gov. Nyesom Wike of Rivers, was engaging Atiku in a fight to finish, has undermined any momentum he had hoped to build.
This, Onanuga said, was with further loss of confidence in the PDP by its own members who could not find any redeeming feature in the fast disappearing party.
“It is crystal clear that Atiku’s latest bid for Nigeria’s top job has hit the rocks, a pillar of Atiku’s campaign is the claim of being a unifier and nationalist.
“That bogus claim has now been discredited, even within his party, as the disaffected members cry for justice and inclusivity.
“Instead of the perennially running and perennially failing candidate to offer them some sop, he has rebuffed them, pleading that he could not grant their request for justice.
“Surely a man who cannot resolve a genuine dispute among his party members, who cannot forge an entente among them, cannot be expected to unify our country,”Onanuga said.
He added that instead of being a unifier, Atiku has became a divider-in-chief.
He said his campaign on this score, was heading for a still birth, just as some of his programmes had been found to be nothing new.
This, he said, was especially as they were already being implemented by the President Muhammadu Buhari-led APC administration.
He said the former Vice-President created the crisis for himself, by pushing the fallacy that only a Northern candidate could win the presidency for his party.
Onanuga said that this was in spite of the open record that Nigerians of Southern extraction, when they network with their Northern compatriots could also win the election.
“Former leaders, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo and Dr Goodluck Jonathan demonstrated this in 1999, 2003 and 2011.
“As a campaign, we can only pity former Vice-President Atiku for the self-inflicted injury he invited unto himself.
“Atiku brought this unto himself and we dare say he can kiss his ill-fated presidential bid goodbye,” Onanuga said. (NAN)
