2023 Election: After meeting Tinubu, Atiku, Peter Obi, Arewa leaders make powerful move

The leadership of the Arewa Joint Committee has debunked the claim that its recent interaction with presidential candidates was meant to endorse a particular candidate in the 2023 election.

On Tuesday, October 18, the committee said that the exercise was not meant to throw weight behind any presidential candidates in the poll, The Punch reported.

The committee constituted The Northern Elders Forum (NEF), Arewa Consultative Forum, Jamiyyar Matan Arewa, Sir Ahmadu Bello Memorial Foundation.

Arewa Research Development Project and Arewa House (Centre for Historical Development and Research).

List of presidential candidates northern leaders invited On the invitation list of the joint committee for the interactive session are the presidential candidates of the following: Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC); Social Democratic Party (SDP), Adewole Adebayo; and Peter Obi of the Labour Party. Others included Kola Abiola of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP); Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Atiku Abubakar, and New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso.

However, the NNPP flagbearer did not show up at the event, alleging that Arewa Joint Committee had chosen a preferred candidate, which was why he was absent.

Have northern leaders endorsed any presidential candidate?

But the committee dismissed the claim, noting that the interaction objection is far above the endorsement of any candidate.

The chairman of the committee and secretary of the Arewa Consultative Forum, Mallam Murtala Aliyu, debunked the claim at a media briefing in Kaduna.

Aliyu noted that the objective of the interaction is to establish the candidates' commitment to addressing the challenges confronting the region.

“We plan to extract and publish these commitments so that Nigerians may measure and evaluate candidates against them. Our goal is to allow citizens to match candidates against their commitments to matters that are central to the interests of the North,” the chairman said.

Legit.ng earlier reported that ahead of the 2023 presidential election, Tinubu, Atiku, and Peter Obi have been unveiling their plans for the country in their bid to convince Nigerians to consider them the best.

The northern leaders under the Arewa joint committee had given them platforms to hear their plans for the region in Zaria, Kaduna state.

The host governor, Nasir El-Rufai, joined the verbal attacks the presidential candidates have engaged in his bid to market the presidential candidate of his party, Bola Tinubu.