Governors who are members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) from the North West and other leaders of the party in the region, on Thursday, insisted that the region must fill the party’s vice-presidential slot.
The zonal stakeholders from the North West boasted that the zone is the biggest political region in the country, adding that it produced more votes for the ruling party in the 2015 and 2019 general elections respectively.
The party’s presidential candidate for the 2023 poll, Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s valid running mate is still being searched for, barely two months to the commencement of nationwide campaigns for the 2023 general polls.
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Rising from a meeting held in Abuja, the governors and other stakeholders urged the party’s presidential candidate to pick his running mate from the North West geopolitical zone.
A communiqué issued at the end of the meeting, signed by the APC zonal vice chairman (North-West), Salihu Mohammed Lukman, said the APC governors, governorship candidates and ministers from the states in the zone were in attendance.
Part of the communiqué reads: “The meeting welcomed the initiative to commence this consultative meeting as vital for strengthening the APC in the North West and improving leadership engagements and cohesion within the zone.
“The zonal meeting welcomed the successful conclusion of primaries at the state and national levels. Participants acknowledged the challenges facing some state chapters of the party and resolved to promote efforts at reconciliation as an urgent priority.
“The meeting noted the contribution of the North West to the emergence and growth of the APC and its electoral viability, with the North West providing about 39% of the votes the APC recorded in the 2019 and 2015 presidential elections.
“Therefore, the zone resolved to aggregate its interests and vital concerns and engage accordingly with the presidential candidate of the party.”
Lukman, the zonal vice chairman had on Wednesday in Kaduna said no party will produce the next president of the country without the massive votes from North West geopolitical zone.
