Atiku: I’m the Best of All APC Aspirant

The former Vice-President and an All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential aspirant, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, at the weekend said he was the most popular among the people contesting for the presidential ticket of the party.

Atiku, who spoke during his visit to the Ondo State executive of the party and delegates in the state in Akure, the state capital, expressed confidence of getting the party’s ticket for the election, saying no other aspirant can defeat him in the primary of the party.

Atiku said the responses he got from his tour of states he had visited indicated that he was the most popular among the party’s presidential aspirants.

On the insinuation that the other leading aspirant and former Head of State, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), is more favoured than him, Atiku insisted that none of the aspirants was ahead of him in the race.

He declared: “Buhari does not have upper hand over me; that is just a media hype, maybe it is you people that wrote that one. With what is on the ground, I am far ahead of them all.

“The response of the delegates I met here is encouraging, if I moved around and count my delegates, by the time I finish, I think I should be okay,” he said.

On whether the national leadership of the party would drop the idea of primary election and handpick a candidate in a way of consensus, Atiku said there was no plan for consensus candidate in the forthcoming primary election of the party, maintaining that all the aspirants would go for primary election.

“There is no way for consensus from the party leaders, we have gone beyond that, we are preparing for the election,” he said.

Meanwhile, the state Chairman of the party, Mr. Isaac Kekemeke, has expressed satisfaction over the screening exercise of the House of Representatives and senatorial aspirants of the party that was concluded last weekend, saying the exercise was thorough and the games were played according to the rules.

He said: “The spirit of tolerance and transparency had been displayed at the exercise. We would play by the rule, the leadership of the party both at the national and state, at this level would play the game by the rule to ensure that the people would be the decider of who their representatives would be.”

Report from Thisdaynews