by Laila Ibrahim

A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Osita Okechukwu, has revealed that the elites in Nigerian politics are opposed to Rtd.Maj-General Muhammadu Buhari, flying the party’s flag at the 2015 presidential elections.

While launching a group, “Friends of Buhari”, in Abuja, Okechukwu said that these elites don’t want Buhari as president because they are aware he would wage unreserved war against corruption – a crime which they are guilty of.

“The tiny top elite are fully aware that General Muhammadu Buhari as a president will stridently, in line with the Manifesto of the APC, wage war against corruption.

“They know he will build new refineries, having built two before as Petroleum Minister; hence putting a stop to refined petroleum products importation where they make billions without query. They know he will not carry raw cash to South Africa to buy military equipment or under fund the Army. They know that he and Tam David-West are the only former Ministers of Petroleum who neither own an oil block nor a petrol station.

“They know that he is the face of APC, that with him as a presidential candidate, the raging puzzle debate that there is no ideological difference between the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and APC will stop. That’s why they crave for PDP vs PDP presidential contest,” Okechukwu said.

“They fought to stop the great merger by forming phantom political associations (but) they failed as we got registered on July 31st 2013.

“Secondly, they attempted to impose Chief Tom Ikimi as the Chairman of our National Executive Committee and failed. They worked hard to make sure that our ward, local government, and state congresses and national convention fail, but we triumphed.

The APC chieftain asked the group to continue to appeal to the leadership of the party to either adopt Buhari as a consensus candidate for the February presidential poll or go through direct primaries where the masses would genuinely and fully participate in electing their presidential candidate.

“Friends of Buhari”, is a group pushing for the election of the former military head of state, as candidate in the 2015 presidential election. Buhari, who is a former head of state was the presidential candidate of the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) in 2003 and 2007; and that of the defunct Congress for Progressives Change (CPC) in 2011.

Emmanuel Chidiogo