People Tinubu helped before abandoned him in 2023 – Yilwatda

By Omeiza Ajayi

National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress APC, Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda, has said that many of the people President Bola Tinubu supported over the years withdrew their backing when he declared his ambition to contest the presidency in 2023.

Yilwatda spoke on Friday at the party’s national secretariat while receiving defectors from opposition parties in Sokoto, Kaduna, Jigawa, Kano and Plateau states.

“People that he has supported all through from the North and South, when he said he wanted to contest, most of them pulled out their support,” he said.

He said Nigerians who had watched Tinubu’s record came out to vote him into office in 2023, notably for his role in the country’s unity and, in his words, for having “defended democracy with his life and his blood.”

Welcoming the new members, Yilwatda said: “Let me welcome all of you to our great party and thank you for taking this decisive action. You are not just changing a platform, but you are coming in to join us in reinforcing our belief in President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his Renewed Hope Agenda.”

He then went through what he described as Tinubu’s record of backing northern politicians, starting in 2007.

“If anybody has worked for the unity of Nigeria, it is President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in 2007, supported Atiku to become the president of Nigeria because he believed then that power should move from the South to the North,” he said.

Yilwatda said Tinubu did the same in 2011 with the present National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, who ran as a presidential candidate under the Action Congress of Nigeria ACN.

“He supported and sponsored his network to ensure that he became the president of Nigeria. He’s from the North,” he said.

In 2015, he said, Tinubu “stood behind President Buhari” with the argument that “For the unity of Nigeria and social cohesion, power should move back to the North because we lost President Yar’Adua.”

He added that in 2019, “when a lot of the northern elders and politicians left Buhari, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu stood for him and led a reconciliation committee that brought Nigerians together to support President Buhari.”

Yilwatda told the defectors that Tinubu had also delivered for the North, citing road and rail projects.

“Most times, they deceive you. They say, ‘What has President Bola Ahmed Tinubu done for the North?’ They keep on saying that,” he said.

He listed the Abuja–Kaduna–Kano road, the Kano–Maiduguri road, and rail links from Kano to Maradi and from Kaduna to Kano, among other projects he said are under way.

“Why did he spend that kind of infrastructure in the South? He’s doing it for us, and we said he has done nothing for us,” he said.

Yilwatda also took on the opposition’s record and promises. He said he had heard Atiku say that the president had blocked all the ports.

“We forgot when we opened those ports long ago. They don’t even read the news. They don’t even follow what’s happening in the country,” he said.

On the opposition’s pledge of a N500 per litre discount on oil, he said it would cost about N20 trillion a year, “about half of our budget as a country.” He argued that government does not have the crude to give, since about 60 per cent of Nigerian oil production is under joint ventures in which the Federal Government holds only part. “How do you make a promise of what you don’t have?” he asked.

He also made claims about the privatisation of public assets. He said that the Aluminium Smelting Company in Akwa Ibom was built for about $3.5 billion, and “Atiku sold it for less than 130 million US dollars, less than four per cent of the total cost of building the company.”

He said the steel companies at Ajaokuta and in Delta were each built for about $1.5 billion and the Delta one was sold for $30 million.

“Away with that man that sold out the future. 3.5 billion for just less than 130 million, 1.5 billion for 30 million,” he said.

The party also presented the candidates who defected. A party member, Dr. Princess Aslam Aliyu, said she had brought 12 African Democratic Congress (ADC) House of Assembly candidates into the APC about two weeks ago. On Friday, she presented 11 House of Representatives and House of Assembly candidates from the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) and the ADC.

She said their candidacies were “verifiable on the INEC portal and INEC records”, referring to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

“These are not merely defections; they are clear demonstrations of confidence in President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR, and the Renewed Hope Agenda as a pathway to national recovery.

“In two weeks, we are bringing 23 opposition candidates back to the APC. If politics is a contest of influence, then our scoreboard currently reads two-zero in our favour,” she added.

Earlier, National Secretary of the party, Sen. Ajibola Basiru, said the APC was not aiming to turn Nigeria into a one-party state.

“So, most of the time, when they say APC wants to turn Nigeria into a one-party state, we are not. That’s not our aspiration,” he said.

He added that if that is what the party’s hard work produces, “we cannot deny that because we have a functional secretariat.”

Basiru also criticised the ADC vice-presidential candidate, Rotimi Amaechi, over his reported comments on the seaport project in Ogun State.

“And yesterday, I heard Rotimi Amaechi saying that we should not have done a seaport in Ogun State because we are only doing a seaport in Ogun State because the president wants to make money from it.

“How can you say that a developmental project, which is being embarked on in support of a leading economy, should not have been done because we want to politicise it?” he asked.

On fuel subsidy, he said: “We are not going back to subsidy. It’s gone and gone forever.” He also defended the student loan scheme, the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND), saying more than 1.4 million students had benefited. He faulted former senator Dino Melaye for criticising the N20,000 monthly allowance paid to beneficiaries, saying students’ fees are paid in addition to it.

The post People Tinubu helped before abandoned him in 2023 – Yilwatda appeared first on Vanguard News.