20 Reps Pick Nomination Form For Tambuwal Via Leadership Newspapers Tambuwal’s presidential aspiration has taken a new turn as 20 members of the House of Representatives yesterday collected the presidential nomination and expression of interest form on his behalf. APC’s national organising secretary, Senator Osita Izunazo, told journalists that House spokesman Hon Zakari Mohammed led others to the APC secretariat where they collected the form. Although none of the lawmakers spoke to journalists, a party source disclosed that those who picked the form were not sure whether Tambuwal would accept it. “They said they did not get the consent of the speaker before coming to pick the presidential nomination form on his behalf. They further explained that it was the speaker who would tell the whole world whether he had joined the race or not,” said the lawmaker. According to the APC timetable, today is the last day for the submission of the nomination form for the presidential primary. LEADERSHIP friday recalls that Tambuwal, while defecting to the APC two weeks ago, gave political developments in his home state, Sokoto, as the reason for his action. It was already taken for granted that Tambuwal would be picked as the APC consensus candidate for the Sokoto State governorship election. Sokoto State governor Aliyu Wamakko had told stakeholders of the party in the state a few days before Tambuwal’s defection to the APC that the plan to install him as the party’s governorship candidate was hatched long ago. “I want to inform all stakeholders of the APC gathered here that Tambuwal has been with us since the formation of our great party. We told him to remain in PDP until the day of nomination of the party’s governorship candidate, and today is the day,” he had said. Apparently, the governor had pencilled down Tambuwal as his successor, and to smoothen the plot, the governorship slot was also zoned to Sokoto South where the speaker hails from. APC Presidential Ticket: Game Plan Of Tambuwal’s Promoters Revealed Tambuwal dramatic entry into the APC presidential race appears to be a ‘third force’ game plan to stop the older aspirants eyeing the ticket of the party, LEADERSHIP Friday has learnt. It was gathered that, upon resumption on December 3, the APC caucus in the House would pass a vote of confidence on Tambuwal and then go ahead to endorse him for the 2015 presidential race. But whatever the plan is, the sudden drafting of the youthful speaker is already creating ripples within the opposition party. Also, the position of APC’s presidential running mate has been zoned to South West, with Ondo and Ekiti states topping the calculation. Amid these developments, the leadership of the party has kept mum as calls made to the party’s national publicity secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, were not answered by the time of going to press. In the same vein, Tambuwal’s special adviser on media and publicity, Mallam Imam Imam, said he could not talk to LEADERSHIP Friday because he was at a seminar. A text message to him to explain the reason for the speaker’s sudden change of mind was also not replied. Similarly, when the national chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, was asked to react to the issue at a press conference he addressed yesterday at the national secretariat of the party, Lai Mohammed asked him not to respond, saying it was not part of their brief for the day. But speaking in confidence to our correspondent, a top party official explained that dragging Tambuwal into the race would compound the problems on ground over the ambitions of former head of state General Muhammadu Buhari, former vice president Atiku Abubakar, Kano State governor Musa Kwankwaso, his Imo State counterpart Rochas Okorocha and LEADESHIP Group founder Mr Sam Nda-Isaiah. “The issue has been on since Tambuwal joined us but some of us are not happy with the idea of dragging him into the race when we are still having problems about how to handle the presidential primaries, especially the refusal of Atiku and others to step down for General Buhari. “If I may tell you, the initial plan that gave birth to the merger was the alliance between the ACN and the CPC after the 2011 general election when the result showed General Buhari scoring 12 million votes, and the idea was that if the block votes from the South West could be added to that of Buhari, then the opposition would have won and that was how the issue of merger began. “But the return of Atiku has compounded the problem because the initial plan was to adopt General Buhari as a consensus candidate, and now with Atiku insisting on primaries, the party leadership has bent backward, but the fear in some quarters is that, in any primary, with his experience, Atiku has what it requires to emerge the winner, but some party leaders are not comfortable with that,” the party source disclosed. According to him, while the likes of the national deputy chairman, Senator Lawal Shuaibu, are rooting for Atiku, the national vice chairman, North West, and the national treasurer are of Buhari camp, while the National Treasurer is a supporter of Kwankwaso. Another party source explained that Tambuwal became the last-card option when the aspirants from the north refused to step down, coupled with the fact that Tambuwal had age, exposure and less public encumbrance on his side, hence some are pushing for him. “Tambuwal is in his late 40s. He has never been accused of being corrupt, or accused of being a religious fundamentalist and all these could help the party if he is presented as the candidate. “Apart from that, perhaps his promoters are of the view that two of the leading aspirants who have all lost previous presidential contests could take a rest. He is the third force as it were, but that means going back on our words because we had earlier resolved not to have our candidate from the PDP ilk. “However, we are still watching the unfolding scenario because so many things are going to unfold, especially now that the position of the running mate has been zoned to the South West. Even though it is meant for Ondo and Ekiti to fill, there is already a big scramble for the slot,” he said.
Posted on: Fri, 14 Nov 2014 04:20:40 +0000
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