Some former governors in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday opposed the consensus candidacy being promoted by four presidential aspirants of the party.
They argued that a consensus was capable of causing disunity that could affect the party’s chances of winning next year’s elections.
The ex-governors are Sule Lamido (Jigawa), Babangida Aliyu (Niger), Boni Haruna (Adamawa), and Ibrahim Idris (Kogi).
They gave the warning after a meeting hosted by Lamido at his Abuja residence.
In the statement, the former governors and the stakeholders argued that what the PDP needed most now was a synergy that would result in producing Nigeria’s next President in 2023 and not an idea that could result in a North-South divide within the party.
The statement reads in part: “Our coming together as key stakeholders from the Northern states is only to debunk any notion or impression, which might have been created by Prof. Ango Abdullahi’s media statement about the Northern Elders Forum having shortlisted consensus PDP presidential candidates.
“The PDP, as conceived by its founding fathers, is and remains the foremost national political platform wherein the democratic aspirations of its teeming members can be actualized devoid of any sectional consideration. Our party is neither Northern nor Southern but Nigeria!”