…Says North will not fail in keeping its promise of voting APC massively
On Friday, Senator Ahmad Abubakar MoAllahyidi, the convener and a leader of a pro All Progressives Congress (APC) group, known as Arewa New Agenda (ANA), said that Northerners are covenant keepers, and will not fail in voting the party.
MoAllahyidi was replying the leader of the factional Yoruba socio-cultural group, Afenifere, Ayo Adebanjo, who said during a press conference in Abeokuta, that the northern extraction will not vote for Bola Tinubu in the forthcoming 2023 Presidential election.
The convener of ANA maintained that Adebanjo does not speak for the north, while asserting that the North will vote massively for Tinubu.
“We wish to state that our organization respects elderly persons but, in this case, we disagree with the position taken by Pa Ayo. More so as he does not speak for the north and has no such mandate; for his information the north has never failed to keep to its promise; when the north makes a covenant, the north keeps to it.
“The North is the strongest ally of APC in the contest for the 2023 primaries in the same manner that the South West was ally for the victory of the APC in the last two election cycles.
“Northern Governor of APC extraction led the charge for power shift from the north to the south; something the likes of Pa Ayo were unable to do simply because to make a covenant Pa Ayo, is not a northerner, and we cannot remember when we northerners appointed him to convey a message to any one; therefore, his assertion as widely reported is not only false but unfounded and can be better seen as the action of a meddlesome interloper or on a lighter scale the antics of a busy body.
“The group is totally dismayed, shocked, surprised and disbeliefs a statement credited to such an elder in Abeokuta on Saturday January 4, 2023, making the rounds in social and conventional media circles in which he (Pa Ayo) was quoted to have said that, it’s a typical of him,” MoAllahyidi said
While reading a text to journalists in Abuja, MoAllahyidi said ANA is a forum of concerned northerners comprising of academics, serving and former legislators, diplomats, technocrats, development practitioners, women and youth leaders, politicians, artisans, traders and farmers that is positioned to set an agenda for protection of the interest of the North.
He told Ayo that the yes of Northern leaders of thoughts is their yes and the integrity of ANA as respected individual cannot be bought over.
He went down memory lane to remind Ayo and Nigerians that Olusegun Obasanjo became the flag-bearer of the PDP and won the 1999 and 2003 presidential elections mainly because of the backing he received from the North.
“In the APC Presidential primaries of 2022, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu scored 1,271votes more than half of the total votes cast in the convention to win the primaries, majority of these votes come from the north; the same north that Pa Ayo said will not support Tinubu
“Given what is unfolding in the South West today Pa Ayo’s attempt to justify his position by saying that his submission is based on fairness justice and equity is indeed laughable because it was said that whoever is coming to equity must come with clean hands. Records have shown that every presidential candidate that Pa Ayo opposes ended up winning the election- Asiwajus’s case will not be different.
“Just because Pa Ayo has some differences with Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu does not in any way mean that the Yoruba race think the same, as we have our doubts that he has the mandate to speak for the Yorubas.
“We warn that this is the time for high wire political activities that usually culminate into tension and suspicion; we call for restrain in all utterances. From our research Pa Ayo’s statement was not driven by any nationalist instinct or principle; it is just a personal vendetta against the personality of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
“We advise Pa Ayo to stop taking advantage of African culture of respect for the old to pursue a very myopic, narrow minded and selfish political vendetta, this a pure act of mischief and malice.
“Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu has visited many States in the North, made policy statements and made a committal promises to us, if GOD Almighty gives him the opportunity to serve as our next president, we the northerners will hold him accountable to that.
“Based on the past excellent record of performance and antecedents of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu in his various callings, the north is comfortable with him. He supported northern presidential candidates in the past; the north has reciprocated this gesture on every occasion; the present situation is no different as the north will repeat the performance by overwhelming support to the Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu in the 2023 presidential election,” he said.
