The Governor of Katsina State, Aminu Masari has opened up on the real reason why Northern Governors opted to support the presidential ambition of President-elect Bola Tinubu even when two prominent northerners were in the race.
The governor made the revelation while speaking on Friday in Daura during a farewell visit to the Emir of Daura, Alhaji Umar Faruq-Umar.
Masari noted that the All Progressives Congress (APC) governors decided to back Tinubu due to to their respect for the zoning arrangement.
‘God had saved us from shame during the last general elections where the APC recorded huge successes,’ he said.
Masari noted that the current administration would have been regarded as a failure had the party lost the presidential poll.
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‘God helped President Muhammad Buhari to defend his integrity, because if we had failed in the election, he would be the first to be blamed.’
The governor added that he and his colleagues had foresight and saw the attempts to tarnish the Nigerian leader’s image.
Masari said though political parties believe in zoning, some people in the APC wanted to ignore it ahead of 2023, ‘but we rejected”.
The Katsina helmsman opined that the lack of respect for zoning formula in some parties brought them into the crises they face.
Masari added that northerners succeeded in earning the respect of the people, ‘because once we said yes, it’s always yes’.
This is coming barely days after Plateau State Governor who also doubles as the Chairman of the Northern Governors Forum, Simon Lalong came out to claim that the Northern Governors of the ruling APC did not necessarily want the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, to be President of Nigeria when they insisted that power must shift to the southern part of the country.
According to Lalong, who held the position of the Director General of Tinubu’s Presidential Campaign organisation, their push to have a southern presidency was rather in order to promote the unity, peace, and stability of Nigeria within the spirit of fairness, equity, and justice which the late Premier of the Northern Region, Sir Ahmadu Bello, stood for.