THE Vice Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Kashim Shettima, has asked Nigerians to look beyond the age and health of the party’s flagbearer, Bola Tinubu.
Speaking at a dinner hosted in honour of President Muhammadu Buhari in Lagos on Monday, January 23, Shettima urged Nigerians to look at the bigger picture of what Tinubu’s presidency holds for the country.
READ ALSO:
- Tinubu appoints former Daily Trust editors as campaign media aides
- Tinubu speaks on economic plans, says subsidy removal long overdue
- [UPDATED] Was Tinubu the first governor to raise bond for infrastructure in Nigeria as claimed by Fashola?
- 2023: Buhari to campaign for Tinubu in 10 states
- What if Tinubu has Parkinson’s disease?
- From age, bagman to education: Bola Tinubu’s many controversies
Explaining that he was not saying Nigerians should not conduct a critical assessment of their leaders, the former Borno State governor described concerns expressed over Tinubu’s health and age as mischievous.
He noted that he and the former Lagos State governor were not preparing to participate in the Olympics but for what he described as governance that “thrives on superior ideas”.
“There is this mischievous fixation on Asiwaju’s health and age,” he said.
“We are not urging Nigerians to turn down critical assessments of their leaders but we direct them to look at the larger picture, we are not preparing for the Olympics but an institution that thrives on the superiority of ideas and established track records.”
He claimed that Tinubu has shown a propensity for sacrificing his personal comfort for the good of the nation.
According to him, right from the days of the nation’s struggle for the enthronement of democracy till date, a lot has been said about Tinubu but largely by “quacks with a poor sense of history.”
Speaking further, Shettima said when Tinubu’s contemporaries were trading their principles for a seat at the table in the Presidential Villa during President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration, he stood for justice and fairness.
He said that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, sought refuge in Tinubu when he was “harassed” by his party in 2007.
“For Atiku Abubakar, in 2007, when he was harassed, intimidated and chased out of the PDP, he (Tinubu) gave him a sanctuary and platform to contest for the presidency of this country under AC,” he said.
“It happened four years later when the same platform was provided for Mallam Nuhu Ribadu to contest for the presidency of this country.
“Those of us from the North owe him (Tinubu) debt of gratitude for supporting our leader, President Muhammadu Buhari, in 2015 and 2019.”
You can reach out to me on Twitter via: vincent_ufuoma