Mr Osita Okechukwu, Director-General, Voice of Nigeria (VON) has faulted Bauchi Gov. Bala Mohammed of Bauchi’s argument against All Progressives Congress (APC)zoning of the 2023 presidency to the South.
Okechukwu also a founding member of the APC, while speaking with newsmen on Thursday in Abuja, said the governor got it wrong on all fronts.
He added that the governor’s disposition showed lack of dynamism in the political thinking of his opposition Peoples Democratic Party(PDP).
The VON DG said that the opposition party had shown that it was incapable of upstaging APC, especially when the unity and prosperity of Nigeria was not uppermost in its calculations.
He said that the governor had after a visit to former President Olusegun Obasanjo in Abeokuta recently, told journalists that APC’s decision to zone the presidency to the South was not a threat to the PDP.
“Mohammed and by extension PDP, are simply being opportunistic by saying that APC’s zoning of the presidency to the South is not a threat to the PDP, because if we put it to the North, it will give us more electoral victory.
“That’s ethnic chauvinism the governor and PDP seem to forget that Nigerians are fair-minded and upholds justice and equity in their voting preferences.
“That was why the late Moshood Abiola of Social Democratic Party (SDP), defeated Alhaji Bashir Tofa in his Kano State home in 1993 presidential election.
“In 2023, Nigerians are going to repeat that feat by acknowledging President Muhammadu Buhari and APC’s decision to do the right things for national unity, peace and progress,” he said.
Okechukwu said the doctrine of swaping political offices between the North and the South was a masterstroke by President Muhammadu Buhari.
He added that the decision was good for the APC and Nigerians in every sense, saying that it was not only a threat to the PDP, but also signal to its imminent defeat.
“My friend governor’s reaction seems inspired by sense of defeatism and phobia for APC. The North cannot be led by the nose by Gov. Mohammed and his co-travellers,”Okechukwu said.
He recalled how notable northern politicians like Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, Mr Umaru Shinkafi, Malam Adamu Ciroma, Dr Sola Saraki among others, out of overriding public interest and uncommon patriotism constructed the zoning convention.
This, he said, birthed the 4th Republic as the longest democratic era in the country’s history.
