By Akinwale Kasali
Chairman, Nigerian Institute of Journalism, NIJ, Governing Council, and Former Ogun State, Aremo Segun Osoba, has revealed there was a consensus among the political parties that merged to form the All Progressives Congress, APC, that the Presidency will return to the South after President Muhammadu Buhari’s two-term tenure.
The APC chieftain added that in 2014, prior to the merger by the three major political parties and a splinter group from the ruling party then known as the New Peoples Democratic Party, nPDP, there was an agreement on power rotation.
The three political parties were the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), a formidable party in the south west, the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), and and a splinter of the APGA.
Osoba, featuring on ARISE Television, said that asba founding member of the APC, the agreement in 2014 was that the President will go to the North while the Chairman comes from the South.
He added that there was an unambiguous gentleman agreement of how the Presidency will move from North to South upon the conclusion of Buhari’s tenure.
He, however, explained that for 2023, the three southern geopolitical zones can put up candidates for the party’s primary and anyone who clinches the ticket will be the Presidential candidate of the APC.
“We had a clear gentlemanly understanding that the Northern part of the country will produce the President when we did the merger in 2013. And the Chairman of the party will then come from the South.
“We have had a President for six and a half years now from the North in APC.
“The President will be there for eight years until 2023. The chairmanship has moved from Chief Bisi Akande in South-West to John Oyegun from South-South and then from John Oyegun to Adams Oshiomhole, also from South-South.
“Of course, at the end of the tenure of President Muhammadu Buhari, the gentlemanly arrangement is that the Presidency will come to the South and I talk of the South in terms of the two territories that were forced to amalgamate in 1914 which means the South-south, the South-east and the South-west zones which are also not in the constitution can bid and should be allowed to produce the next president for this country.
“Therefore, those from the South-east, South-south and South-west can put up candidates for the party’s primary and whoever emerges from the primary can then be the candidate of our party. “That is the gentlemanly understanding that we reached when we were doing the merger arrangement.”
