The Kano State Governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, on Thursday changed his position on the use of consensus arrangement to pick the presidential candidate for the All Progressives Congress in the 2015 Presidential election.
Kwankwaso had said on Monday in Abuja that the APC was already considering the option of producing its candidate through a consensus arrangement, but that such an action might not produce the expected result.
However, the governor, who was in the Senate to canvass for the support of members of his party in the upper chamber, said he would not mind a consensus arrangement if that would produce a credible candidate.
He said, “People are worried and very much concerned about the issue of primary. Let me tell you that our constitution has provided for consensus. It has also provided for election.
“For those of us who came from the Peoples Democratic Party, we know the advantages and disadvantages of primary election. However, if you look at it critically from 1999 to 2011, every election year, PDP was having primary, even when we had a sitting President in 2003 and 2011, we had primary elections.
“All other parties were not doing primary election in the actual sense of it. They sit down and look at faces and say, ‘you, do this’; that is a guess work. Yes, maybe he is number one here but when you go to the field, he may not be number one.
“That is why I am personally calling for a consensus. However, if it doesn’t happen, I believe primary election is so good for the party. We have seen that since we have quite a number of aspirants, all of us are working; everybody is working very hard, especially those of us from the PDP.”
Kwankwanso, who described Mark’s leadership of the National Assembly as “powerful and responsible,” said that though he had yet to formally declare his interest in the presidential race, he was in the National Assembly to see the President of the Senate, members and other officers of both chambers as part of his consultation.
Kwankwaso said that Nigerians were tired of the current administration at the federal level. He, therefore, urged the senators to support his ambition in order to change the status quo.
But Mark told Kwankwanso that he (Mark) would not support his presidential ambition on the platform of the APC.
Mark said, “It is completely impossible for me to support you. Good as your wishes may be, I can’t grant them. The PDP is the correct platform to contest election and I have always advised the senators so. If you don’t make it in your new party, feel free to come back to us because you have always belonged to this side.”
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