From Wole Balogun, Ado Ekiti
Former envoy to Canada, Ambassador Dare Bejide, has said former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar’s leaving the All Progressives Congress is signal that President Muhammadu Buhari has disappointed Nigerians.
Bejide, a PDP governorship aspirant in Ekiti State, said it is dangerous for the APC to have lost a politician of Atiku’s clout.
“His coming to our party will help us to regain power at the centre in 2019.”
On the contest for the PDP’s national chairmanship seat, Bejide predicted doom for the party if the South West is excluded as being allegedly stage-managed by some party top notches.
Former governor Gbenga Daniel, Chief Bode George, Prof. Tunde Adeniran and Mr. Jimi Agbaje are top aspirants jostling for the party’s plum seat.
Bejide spoke in Ikere Ekiti, yesterday, during a meeting with some party members in the local government ahead, of the 2018 governorship election.
The former envoy, who promised he will clinch the party’s ticket, in spite of Governor Ayodele Fayose’s adoption of his deputy, Prof. Kola Olusola, as preferred candidate, added that Atiku’s defection will impact on the PDP positively.
“For a politician of Atiku’s standing to have defected shows president Buhari’s poor performance in government. It confirms the APC is not the best for Nigeria and his coming is a good development for our party,” he said. Bejide also said the outcome of the PDP December 10 national convention will determine how the 2019 will look like for the party. “It is only logical to make someone from the South West the national chairman. Since the formation of the PDP in 1998, nobody from that zone has been elected into that position and this is the right time and opportunity to correct that neglect. Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, is from the South West, the APC National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu is from the zone and the party controls five states out of six, so, it will be suicidal for the PDP to neglect the region in its political calculations.”