The Chairman of the Atiku-Okowa Presidential Campaign Council in Lagos State, Adedeji Doherty has said that the main opposition party in the country, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will correct its mistake while in power between 1999 and 2015 if its presidential flagbearer, Atiku Abubakar emerges as president in 2023.
Doherty stated this on Monday when he featured as guest on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme.
“I believe that the PDP has retraced its steps, we have made mistakes all along the road to making Nigeria great and it is time we stabilised this country and give PDP another chance to make good its promises,” he said.
He noted that Atiku, who served as Nigeria’s Vice-President between May 1999 and May 2007 during the tenure of the then-President Olusengun Obasanjo after the military era helped to stabilize the country’s economic team.
“You must give the PDP the credence that it was able to stabilize democracy in Nigeria and these two gentlemen (Atiku and Obasanjo) were the pioneer persons that did this job,” he stated.
Moving away from it presidential candidate and party, Doherty chided the ruling All Progressives Congress in Lagos State, saying that it does not deserve to win in the 2023 governorship polls as its performance in the state has been short of peoples expectation.
“I don’t think the All progressives Congress should even be vying for anything right from the presidential (seat) up to the local government, especially in Lagos State,” Doherty noted.
This is as the PDP is yet to win the governorship seat in Lagos since the start of the Fourth Republic in 1999.
The defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD) produced Bola Tinubu, who was in office as state governor between May 1999 and May 2007. The AD metamorphosed into the Action Congress (AC) and produced Tinubu’s protégé, Babatunde Fashola, as governor for another eight years. The AC also changed to the All Progressives Congress (APC) which produced Akinwunmi Ambode as governor in 2015 and Babajide Sanwo-Olu in 2019.
Although Sanwo-Olu is seeking re-election in 2023, the PDP governorship candidate in Lagos, Olajide Adediran aka Jandor hopes to break a 24-year record of Tinubu’s dominance next year.
Tinubu, now the APC presidential candidate for the 2023 general elections, is in the race alongside PDP’s Atiku and Labour Party’s Peter Obi in a contest described as a three-horse race.
