Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Abubakar Atiku, has urged northerners to vote him a man from the fold, saying they should not vote a Yorubaman or Igboman.
His key opponents are Yoruba and Igbo respectively – Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and Peter Obi.
According to him, what Nigeria needs to get her working again was a pan-Nigerian president which, he said he would be.
This is contained in a video shared online on Saturday.
He said, “What the average northerner needs is somebody from the North who also understands the other parts of Nigeria
This is what the northerner needs. He doesn’t need a Yoruba candidate or an Ibo candidate. I stand before you as a pan Nigerian of Northern origin.”
Also, in a statement by Mr Paul Ibe, Media Adviser to Atiku Abubakar, made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), in Abuja, he emphasised inclusivity.
Atiku, also a former Vice President of Nigeria, according to Ibe, noted this when he featured as a guest of the Arewa Joint Committee interactive sessions with various presidential candidates of political parties on Saturday in Kaduna.
He also said that the credential of national inclusivity, not ethnicity should be an ideal that the Northern part of the country should examine in electing a new president for the country in the 2023 elections.
He noted that with a political career spanning more than three decades, he stood shoulder high as a Northerner who built bridges of unity across the country.
“I have been in politics for more than three decades and I am a Northerner. So, if you ask me why I am the best candidate to lead Nigeria in 2023, I will simply say that what Nigeria needs is a pan-Nigerian president, not whether he is Yoruba, Igbo or Hausa-Fulani.”
Delivering his speech at the event, he highlighted the key policy agendas which he intended to pursue if elected president to include promoting national unity through deliberate actions that would secure mutual trust and confidence among all tendencies.
The other policy areas that he enumerated were reforms in education, agriculture and reversing the economic downturn of the country.
According to Ibe, the session, which took place at the Arewa House, was attended by high ranking leaders of various North based socio-cultural bodies.
