The report says Tinubu told northern elders at a secret meeting that Yorubas won’t mind Muslim-Muslim ticket if he picks APC 2023 presidential ticket.
2023 presidential hopeful, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu has told leaders of thought in the northern part of the country that his South West Yoruba people will not mind a Muslim – Muslim ticket.
The Observer Times reports that the APC National Leader, stated this while addressing some elders of the North in Abuja at a secret meeting arranged by his long time friend Sen. Abu Ibrahim.
According to the report,Tinubu said that they should leave the task of convincing the Yoruba to him if selected by his APC to carry the banner of the party in the 2023 elections.
The issue of who would be his running mate, according to our sources, became a major issue at the meeting. They told him flatly they would not accept a Christian northerner to be his running mate .
He was said to have promised to pick a Northwest Muslim politician as his running mate to which a prominent politician and former governor asked him how that will be taken in the South.
Tinubu, according to our sources, told his guests the South East and South South who are largely Christians will not matter. It is the South West, he was quoted to have said , that could raise issues but he will manage that and they will not mind.
Tinubu , at the meeting was said to have argued that the vote of the North West, North East, some largely Muslim states in the North Central, as well as South West were enough to make him President.
“All I need is your support,” he was quoted as having said. “ Leave the rest to me, I will handle it,” he was quoted as saying.
His guests were said not to have been convinced by his assurance as no regime in the country since independence has governed with both head and deputy as Muslims.
It is believed that come February, 2022 when the APC, on his platform he will contest for the presidency is most certain to pick a Muslim Chairman from the North Central part of the country.
Aspirants for this position are already emerging from Niger, Kwara and Nasarawa states . These candidates are all Muslims . If Tinubu therefore emerges as APC candidate and picks a Muslim candidate from the North West it means all of the important positions in the party are held by Muslims to the exclusion of the Christians.
Part of the argument of the pro -Tinubu elements is that this has happened before when the late billionaire Muslim Aare Moshood Abiola selected Alhaji Babagana Kingibe as his running mate in the 1993 presidential election and won.
One of the northern leaders present at the meeting said ,while this was true, things had charged adding that that time is different from now. He explained that there were all manners of tensions in the land at the moment and the security of the nation was fragile.
He stressed that if anybody tried that now it would be like deliberately setting the country on fire.
“The IPOB issue is still raging in the South East, young elements are restless in the SW and calling for Oodua Republic, banditry , Boko Haram and ISWAP insurgency has enveloped the North. Why would anyone want to add religious crisis to it?” He asked.
He added, “Only a non-patriot will experiment with this. I told him my mind. This will not work. Let him accept this or not but I won’t be part of the effort to set Nigeria on fire.”
