A socio-cultural group of Yoruba leaders under the aegis of the Yoruba Elders’ Union (YEU) has declares support for the former two terms Vice President of the federal Republic of Nigeria during the General Olusegun Obasanjo administration from 1999 to 2007 – His Excellency Abubaka Atiku of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) – during the forthcoming 2023 general election. This decision was taken at their meeting in Lagos on Tuesday, 7th of February, 2023.

Prof. Muhammad Omolaja, the President of the Union, said that YEU considered all the presidential candidates from various political parties using, inter alia, criteria such as competence, experience, health, and general acceptability of the candidates. Alhaji (Prince) Muhammad Omolaja said that H. E. Abubakar Atiku stands clear among his presidential candidate colleagues as regards competence and health.

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In terms of the experience at the presidency level, the Yoruba leaders found that only Alhaji Abubakar Atiku has it among the candidates having served as the Vice President for eight years, and therefore, it will be easier for him to take off upon his election as the President than for a new person who will have to spend about 6 months or more to study the situation in the office before taking off properly and effectively! The challenges in the Nigeria of today would not allow this delay to ameliorate the prevailing sufferings of the Nigerian masses. As regards acceptability, the Yoruba leaders also agreed that H. E. Abubakar Atiku is the most widely accepted presidential candidate across the six geopolitical zones of the country. Abubakar Atiku has been building his network of politics and business for over 40 years! Hence, he is well known in the north, south, west and east of the country.

At the human relations level, Prof. Omolaja said that H. E. Abubakar Atiku is the most detribalized among all the candidates. He relates very well with people from different parts of the country. He married from the southwest (Yoruba), Southeast (Igbo) and from the north (Hausa/Fulani), and he doesn’t discriminate on religious affairs. His choice of a Muslim/Christian ticket also makes him superb in this respect!

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Prof. Omolaja, after the meeting while addressing the journalist, said that already the facts on ground favour Alhaji Abubakar Atiku over and above other presidential candidates. For instance, about three weeks to the election, Abubaka Atiku is clearly leading in the northeast, northwest, north central and south-south geopolitical zones; that is, Atiku and PDP are already leading in four out of the six geopolitical zones of the country. The southeast will probably be dominated by Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) who is from Anambra State with Atiku coming second. However, in the southwest, it is either Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progress Congress (APC) from Lagos State comes first with H. E. Abubakar Atiku coming second; and vice versa. It is apparently clear that the situation in the northeast from where the All Progressives Congress (APC) picked their presidential running mate, Alhaji Shetima from Borno State, cannot make a significant difference as the northeasterners will definitely not drop being the region producing the President for a Vice President!

Apart from this, the northern belt of Nigeria is more than the southern belt in terms of the population, political consciousness and number of States; that is, 17 States in the south and 19 States plus the federal Capital Territory of Abuja in the north. In any case, anytime there are two or more serious presidential candidates in the southern Nigeria, the northern candidate always carry the day! For example, in the 1979 presidential election when Obafemi Awolowo was in the race from the southwest and Nnamdi Azikiwe was in the race from the southeast, Alhaji Shehu Shagari from the north won the election. Again, it was the same in 1983 when Alhaji Shehu Shagari won for his second term in office as the Executive President and Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces of the federal Republic of Nigeria. It is crystal clear from all indications that history is about to repeat itself in favour of H. E. Alhaji Abubakar Atiku in the forthcoming February 25, 2023 presidential election.

Because of the fact that at this time around, the atmosphere is not clear for the country to produce a President of the southern belt origin, the Yoruba Leaders therefore urge all well meaning Nigerians especially Yoruba sons and daughters and the Southerners in general to forget about all sentiments and come out en masse to cast their votes for H. E. Abubakar Atiku of the PDP during the February 25, 2023 presidential election. This will allow the incoming President Atiku to support the zoning of the presidential candidature to the south after the tenure of his administration.