General News of Monday, 24 April 2023

Source: www.premiumtimesng.com

Group asks Tinubu to compensate North-west with senate pesidency

Bola Tinubu Bola Tinubu

A support group within the North-west chapter of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has asked the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, to allow the zone to produce the next senate president.

It said this will ensure the consolidation of the strength of the party in the region.

The Support Group for Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu in the North-west made the call during a press conference in Kano on Sunday.

The youth leader for the APC North-west, Abdulalmid Umar, who spoke on behalf of the group, said the zone produced the highest number of votes for the APC during the 25 February presidential polls.

Mr Umar said zoning the position to the North-west will encourage the party to vote for the ruling party in future elections.

“The President-elect should be consolidating on the high votes he recorded in our zone so as to override attempts that both PDP and NNPP will make to muzzle APC.

“The pressure will be too much on our party and membership if we do not have a formidable force to withstand pressures from opposing parties who already have Kano governorship and four out of the six governors from the zone.

“To retain our relevance in the zone, push ahead to gain more grounds, as well as consolidate on our electoral performance, the zone, more than any other should have the senate president,” the group said.

The group’s position is against the proposal of the Progressives Governors Forum (PGF) that the president of the 10th Senate should be a Christian.

The APC governors, in a recent memo sent to Mr Tinubu, said the party should consider the South-south and South-east as preferred zones for the senate presidency, while the speaker should be left for North-west and North-central.

The APC governors equally asked the party to consider the contribution of each of the six zones during the presidential election in zoning the National Assembly offices.

Out of the 6.6 million total votes in the North-west, Mr Tinubu got 2.65 million. In the South-east, he polled 127,605 votes and 799,957 votes in the South-south.