The All Progressives Congress National Working Committee has denied reports that it has endorsed Senate President Ahmad Lawan as its consensus candidate for the 2023 elections.
Alhaji Sulaiman Argungu, APC National Organising Secretary, said this after an NWC meeting in Abuja on Monday.
He acknowledged that Abdullahi Adamu, the APC National Chairman, briefed the committee on the issue, saying, however, that it was not deliberated on at the meeting.
Argungu said: “You can see that we are all just coming out of the NWC meeting and we were fully briefed by our National Chairman, Senator Abdullahi Adamu.
“And he did brief us that Senator Ahmad Lawan, President of the Senate, is our consensus candidate for the APC National Convention.
“That is the information he gave us, but it not an issue that was deliberated on the floors of the NWC.
“It was just an information he gave us and all of us are entitled to our opinions as democrats.”
The APC National Organising Secretary added that the decision was not from the party’s NWC, stressing that it was an individual decision that was never deliberated by the committee.
Argungu said that the APC NWC was in agreement with Saturday’s resolution of the 11 Northern Governors that the presidency must shift to the South in 2023 after the tenure of President Muhammadu Buhari.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the 11 governors from the North had in a statement announced their support for power shift to the South at the end of the tenure of Buhari.
The governors, while urging APC presidential aspirants from the region to step down from the 2023 presidential race, said: “The decision to support power shift to the South is in the best interest of the country.”
The Northern APC governors also commended their Jigawa State counterpart, Governor Abubakar Badaru, for withdrawing from the race ahead of the presidential primaries slated from June 6 to June 8.
The governors who signed the communique at the end of the meeting included Governor Aminu Masari of Katsina State; Sani Bello, Niger; Abdullahi Sule, Nasarawa; and Babagana Zulum, Borno.
Others were Simon Lalong of Plateau; Umar Ganduje, Kano State; Atiku Bagudu of Kebbi; Nasir El-Rufai, Kaduna State; Muhammad Yahaya, Gombe; and Bello Matawalle of Zamfara.
Buhari had at a meeting with APC presidential aspirants on Saturday approved power shift to the South in the 2023 poll.
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