Also, the Spokesperson of the Presidential Campaign Council, PCC, of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Festus Keyamo, says the ruling party has agreed on the region where it would flag off its campaigns for the 2023 elections
Keyamo made this disclosure after a-three hour meeting between the presidential candidate of the party, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, APC governors, members of PCC, and the party’s National Working Committee, NWC.
He further said that no specific date has been picked for the flag-off of the campaign of the ruling party because the schedule of President Muhammadu Buhari, who is also the Chairman of the campaign council, was being considered.
Keyamo stressed: “You know that the structure of our campaign involves the presidential diary. I have said that our campaign is not going to be like those that they can kick and start like small vehicles. It is maneuvering a 50-ton tanker on a highway and once we hit the highway, it will be in motion and movement.
“Since Mr President is the chairman of the Campaign Council, we are going to take his diary into consideration in picking and choosing the date. However, we have all virtually agreed to hit the street very soon. We have also agreed on the region we are going to kick-start but I won’t say that now. We have also agreed on all the basic issues. We just want to carry along the leader of the party, Mr President, and hit the street.”
The spokesperson also assured that all the organs of the party are united and working in unison towards one purpose.
Keyamo noted that Tinubu presented a draft manifesto to the party.
According to him, “Our candidate is not the type that operates on his own. He carries everybody along. He presented the draft of the manifesto to all the stakeholders that looked at it. And guess what, almost all the stakeholders gave that draft more than 90 percent passmark.”
The spokesperson, however, refused to give snippets of what the manifesto contained, insisting that Tinubu would present the manifesto to Nigerians himself.
“We can’t give you the content because we are not going to take it away from our candidate. He is going to present himself before Nigerians on a particular date and occasion. We have set up a small committee charged with the responsibility of reducing the manifesto documents to major highlights in message form we will sell to even the market women, street traders in the most simple language.
“We don’t want to present to Nigerians a very complicated document that they cannot understand in simple terms.”
Reacting to the allegation made by the Coalition of United Political Parties, CUPP, that APC has connived with the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Keyamo described the allegation as absolute nonsense.
He said, “There has been absolutely no occasion where the APC, either through NWC or any of levels of leadership put any kind of pressure on INEC. Those sensing defeat are already looking for reasons for that defeat. It is one of the reasons, it is one of the excuses they are trying to generate to accommodate their defeat, but they should know that the defeat is imminent.”
