Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, the presidential candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress APC, is receiving support from Goodluck Jonathan’s supporters in the South East and South South geopolitical zones of the nation.
In addition to criticizing certain southern state governors for backing former vice president Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Tinubu’s followers in November also declared that a Nigerian president of Southern descent was a non-negotiable need.
While kicking off their campaign in Port Harcourt, the capital of Rivers State, Jonathan’s supporters, who are members of Citizens Network for Peace and Development in Nigeria (CNPDN), stated that having Nigeria’s next president emerge from the North after the eight-year rule of incumbent President Muhammadu.
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CNPDN was among the first members of the Southern Coalition to publicly call for the former president Jonathan to run on the APC platform earlier this year.
In order to get Jonathan to enter the contest, the Coalition also enlisted the help of well-known Southern leaders. Jonathan, who had pledged to consult extensively, broke his word at the last minute, allowing Tinubu to become the APC’s nominee for president.
While briefing reporters, Mr. Francis Okereke Wainwei, the national secretary of the coalition and a native of Bayelsa State, stated that they had all unanimously decided to support and vote for Tinubu in the upcoming presidential election in 2023.
He claimed that advancing national harmony, equity, fairness, and justice is the main motivation for supporting the Southern presidential candidate in 2023.
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“In the same vein, our position that the next President of this country should come from the South is driven by same vision and principles”, he stated.
Adding, he noted that, “we believe strongly that such will strengthen the unity and peace of the nation; it will give a better sense of belonging to the people of Southern Nigeria and foster a more viable peaceful co-existence among Nigerians.
“We were therefore surprised by the betrayal of the same cause by some of the Southern Governors, especially the South South Governors, except Nyesom Wike, who had earlier declared for a Southern President, to abandon same and started pursuing their personal interests instead of the collective interest of the region.
“We are therefore, calling on the South South governors who have betrayed their people by supporting another Northern candidate to take over from Buhari after eight years of a president from the North, to resign immediately.
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“This is because the people of the South South zone can no longer trust them with their common heritage as they have placed their personal interests above the collective interest of their people.
“Our call on them to resign is also premised on the fact that they recently received huge sums of money via the 13% derivation fund and squandered same in pursuit of their personal interests at the expense of their people.
“We are also calling on the South South States’ Houses of Assembly to impeach the said governors if they fail to resign as requested.
“We shall mobilize our members across the South South States to force the said governors to resign or get impeached. We can’t allow such selfish governors to continue to govern us anymore. We must all place the collective interest of our people above our personal interests for our region to experience holistic and accelerated development.”
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Calling on members of the Coalition to mobilize massively for Tinubu, Wainwei said: “In order to ensure that a Southern President is elected in 2023 , we hereby call on all our members and people of the South East and the South South zones to massively vote for Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu for President in 2023.
“Tinubu is the easiest means to electing a President from Southern extraction in 2023.He has nationwide acceptance and has the requisite political experience to navigate Nigeria to greatness as President of Nigeria.”
The Coalition, which is non-partisan, also urged its supporters in Rivers State to cast a sizable number of ballots for Siminalayi Fubara, the PDP’s nominee for governor.
“We are also using this medium to call on our members and people of Rivers State to vote, PDP gubernatorial candidate in Rivers State, Siminalayi Fubara as governor of Rivers State. We are supporting the PDP gubernatorial candidate in Rivers State because of the massive infrastructural development built by the current PDP government in the State.”
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The Coalition gave Tinubu’s campaign N1 million in cash to help it in the two geographic zones.
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