Second Republic lawmaker, Dr. Junaid Mohammed, on Friday confirmed that Northern elders actually adopted a resolution to reject President Muhammadu Buhari’s re-election in the 2019 because of his failure to meet the basic demand of the region, but added that the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was not an alternative candidate.
Mohammed, who was a member of the 2014 Constitution Conference, told Saturday Vanguard in an exclusive interview that the Convener of the Northern Elders’ Forum, Prof Ango Abdullahi, spoke the minds of the northern people when he declared that they had rejected Buhari ahead of next year’s election.
“It is clear that APC and Buhari are shocked by the decision of NEF not to support him next year and they have started paying people to attack Ango Abdullahi as if he acted alone in the decision to dump Buhari ahead of the 2019 elections.
“The only missing link in what Ango Abdullahi did was to come out openly to say that the north would support Buhari. It is not so and we never discussed the idea of supporting Atiku because he is not an alternative to Buhari in any form.
“The truth of the matter is that there is no way we can come out openly to support Atiku over Buhari because Atiku has some credibility issues just as Buhari is incompetent to lead Nigeria. As it has become evident, that incompetence has held down the development of Nigeria in the last four years and there is nothing Buhari can do because he has also been captured by a cabal.
“As far as I am concerned those who want to endorse Atiku over Buhari have a lot of explanation to do to the Nigerian people especially regarding issues of selling the core assets of Nigeria to incompetent cronies of the Obasanjo era of which Atiku played a major role and today most of such commercial enterprises have been overtaken by weeds across the country."
