A welcome development in our great party. That is what I have discussed with reporters at NAN north east zonal office yesterday. Its better for our party APC GOVERNORS BACK CONSENSUS CANDIDACY OCTOBER 23, 2014 BY JOHN ALECHENU AND SUCCESS NWOGU The Progressives Governors’ Forum on Wednesday declared its support for consensus method of choosing presidential and other candidates for the All Progressives Congress. The PGF Chairman, Rochas Okorocha, who announced this to journalists after the forum’s meeting in Ilorin, Kwara State on Wednesday, added that neither the forum nor the party had adopted any candidate for the 2015 general elections. He said the forum which comprises APC governors was in support of consensus method of choosing candidates so long as there would be no imposition of anyone on members of the party. Okorocha, who is also the governor of Imo State, added that in the event of a consensus not being reached, the APC could go for credible and transparent primaries. The governor said, “On consensus, our forum is in full support of consensus as one of the ways to produce our presidential candidate or any candidate in the party for as long as it is done with regard to respect for internal democracy. There will be no imposition of candidates in our party. “Our party has not adopted any candidate neither has the forum but we shall encourage consensus and dialogue within the leadership of the party and aspirants to see how we can come up with a candidate but where that is not possible, like true progressives, we shall have a free and fair primary.” Rabiu Kwankwaso of Kano State, who also attended the meeting, is the only progressive governor that had openly kicked against a consensus arrangement. He however made a U- turn recently. It is widely believed that the APC leadership and many of the governors are rooting for a former Head of State, Maj.Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, as the party’s consensus candidate. During Buhari declaration last week, many of them attended unlike when another aspirant and a former Vice-President, Atiku Abubakar, joined the race. Kwankwaso and the publisher of Leadership newspaper, Sam Nda-Isaiah, are the other known APC presidential aspirants. When contacted, the Atiku Campaign Organisation said there was nothing alien about the PGF decision on consensus candidacy. The organisation however argued that “the best form of consensus is the decision of voters in a free and open contest.” Its Director-General, Mallam Garba Shehu, in an email to one of our correspondents, noted that information available to the organisation , was that the governors reiterated what was already in the APC constitution. It said “The information we got from the PGF secretariat is that they said that the APC should explore the option of consensus as provided for by the constitution but where that fails, it should carry out a free, fair and transparent election for a candidate to emerge. “As far as we are concerned, there is nothing new that has emerged from the meeting. The highest office in a democracy is the office of the voter. “We have always said that the best form of consensus is the decision of voters in a free and open contest. Who is afraid of the voter? Consensus is a willing process. People must subject themselves to it. It can’t be imposed.” Attempts to get comments from the Kwankwaso campaign were unsuccessful as of the time of filing this report.
Posted on: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 07:50:03 +0000
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