Spokesperson of the Atiku/Okowa PDP Presidential Campaign Team, Kola Olagbondiyan, fielded questions from Chuks Okocha on critical issues in the party’s presidential campaigns.
Evaluate the presidential campaigns so far. Thisday exit polls is saying there would be a second poll as there won’t be a clear winner on Feb 25, 2023?
The campaign is going on well. The candidate, Atiku Abubakar, is engaging Nigerians through rallies, stakeholders and Townhall meetings. At the rallies, messages are presented to address the yearnings of Nigerians. The issues centred around engendering unity in the polity; securing our nation; restructuring particularly the devolution of power among others.
Expectedly, the people are rallying with the PDP and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.
Atiku Abubakar will win the presidential election at the first ballot because he enjoys the widest acceptability among the ranks of presidential candidates. Atiku alone has the reach to every polling units in the country.
He is also contesting on the platform of the PDP which has the most formidable political structure in the country. He outpaced other candidates with the above strengths.
Atiku’s chances are very bright beyond what we are reading in the public space. I had earlier stated that the PDP on which platform he is contesting has the best spread in terms of structure. There is no hamlet, town or village in this country where you don’t have the PDP and for very obvious reasons, people will always gravitate towards their parties and candidates. No matter what you are hearing, seeing or reading from the two geo-political zones you mentioned, Atiku will do well and get enough votes from these zones that will help fulfil the requirements to win the February 25 presidential election.
That’s why he more experienced than other candidates.
Why the optimism that Atiku will win in the first ballot?
Atiku/Okowa Presidential Campaign Organization believes that with Atiku’s overwhelming support by Nigerians across board, the outcome of the presidential election, in which Atiku will emerge victorious on February 25, 2023, will shock pollsters.
Atiku enjoys the solidarity and support of greater majority of Nigerians who are not captured in the indices relied upon by many of the pollsters in their projections on the 2023 Presidential election.
It is incontrovertible that Atiku will win the majority of lawful votes across the country and garner the constitutionally required 25% of votes in more than 24 States of the federation.
It is evident that the massive traditional voters of the PDP across the polling units, wards, local governments, states and the six geo-political zones are not distracted in their steadfastness to rescue Nigeria from the misrule of the All Progressives Congress (APC) by voting enmasse for Atiku.
The army of traditional voters are unrelenting in mobilizing the non-partisan voters as well as the undecided across the country to vote for the PDP Presidential Candidate.
It is clear that the candidate of the rival APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, lacks the political muscle and national acceptability to stop Atiku at the first ballot.
Our campaign is therefore unfazed knowing that majority of Nigerians across the nation are in consensus to elect Atiku as the next President of our country, particularly, given his proven capacity, competence, political will and national acceptability to provide leadership at this critical time of our national history.
How do you react to the statement by the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Lai Mohammed, that the opening of borders will have great security implications for the country?
Can we then take it that since the borders are currently opened that all the allegations that he made are reflected in the Nigerian situation today? Is that what he’s saying? Because the borders are open as you and I are talking. But I also know that in spite of the opening of the borders that the cost of local rice is different from the cost of the imported rice. Imported rice sells for between 40,000 and 50,000 (Naira) or above, while locally milled rice sells between 30,000 and 40,000.
So, that same differential pooh-poohs the argument and contemplation of Alhaji Lai Mohammed.
Does it follow that the opening of the borders by an Atiku presidency if he wins the presidential election will worsen the security in the country?
Is Lai Mohammed claiming that when the borders were shut by President Muhammadu Buhari that we didn’t have insecurity?
Or is he saying that now that the borders are open, we have more of insecurity than when it was shut?
Alhaji Lai Mohammed is an old man. I know his proclivities, I know why he tries to come out always to come and engage with Atiku. He’s doing all that in order to be seen to be working for the ambition of his friend, Bola Tinubu.
Atiku is never going to be drawn into that arena because Atiku is speaking to Nigerians, he’s addressing the challenges of Nigeria and realistically, Nigerians are agreeing with him that he’s responding to their needs, to their desires.
So, we are not going to allow any form of distraction from Lai Mohammed. You had eight years to speak to Nigerians on the achievements of President Muhammadu Buhari. He failed woefully in delivering on that. But now, he’s looking at every flimsy opportunity to drag with Atiku Abubakar.
We are not cut out for that as a campaign.
He’s not in the race. It is his friend, Bola Tinubu, that’s in the race and is the one Nigerians are waiting for to come into the public arena and debate unscripted.
He should come out to the public arena and debate unscripted. That’s the desire of Nigerians. That’s what Nigerians are waiting for.
Why did the PDP campaign ask President Buhari not to waste his time to campaign for the APC candidate?
It is imperative to state that Nigerians will never entrust the destiny of our nation to any individual who is completely tarnished; whose persona is globally tainted with issues of criminal allegations, who cannot explain the source of his wealth in the face of accusations that it is proceed of corruption.
Of course, there is no way Nigerians will trust or elect an individual who is so depraved that he can present the photograph of another person, former Governor of Cross Rivers State, Donald Duke, as his to gain followership in a documentary used as part of his campaign materials to canvass for votes.
It is strange that anybody can expect Nigerians to elect a failed State Governor whose only achievement is entrenching governance by brawl, personal enrichment and puffery.
Nigerians across the country have since established their preference for the Presidential Candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, over and above Tinubu as the next President of our great country.
This is because Atiku has proven himself as a leader with the required integrity, sound reputation and desired capacity, competence, presence of mind, political will and stamina to lead our nation at this critical time.
The mammoth crowd that received Atiku and his entourage in President Buhari’s home State of Katsina as well as in Imo, Kwara, Gombe, Osun, Akwa Ibom and other States of the federation is a clear pointer to the fact that Nigerians, irrespective of political, ethnic or religious affiliations have pitched their tents with the PDP presidential candidate.
What then is the expectation of Nigerians from the out going president on the matter?
What Nigerians expect from President Buhari at this time is to provide the enabling environment that will guarantee peaceful, free, fair, transparent and credible 2023 general elections as well as a smooth transfer of power in line with the expressed will of the people on May 29, 2023.
