Bukola Saraki
Senate President Bukola Saraki on Wednesday boasted that the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will defeat President Muhammadu Buhari in the 2019 presidential elections.
Saraki said this in Ilorin at a meeting with PDP members who came from the 16 local government areas of the state.
He also expressed his confidence that his new party would emerge victorious in all the local government areas of Kwara State.
Saraki said that the victory of PDP at both federal and state levels would be beneficial to all the members in the state.
The Senate President said that the future of PDP was now brighter than it used to be.
“If we emerge victorious at the federal level, all of us will be the beneficiaries. In the state, with your support we will win the state for PDP.
All of you here are the key players in Kwara politics. With unity of purpose, no party can contest with you.
“We are here to unite all of us under the party we belong to today. I am assuring all members that there will be equity, internal democracy and justice.
“It is not going to be winners take all. As far as I am concerned, everybody here today belong to our political structure.
“There is nothing like old or new Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). We have all become one PDP.
“I want all of us to be united for the progress and development of Kwara State.
“As par the politics of the state, nobody can wrest the power from us I if we are united. By the grace of God we will emerge victorious both at the federal and state levels.
“We will ensure that we work as one party because we have always worked together before.
“We will see that all the wards and local governments’ popular candidates emerge based on their popularity and acceptability,” Saraki said.
He assured PDP members that there would be no anointed candidates in all the elective positions.
“I don’t have any anointed candidate at all levels. I don’t have candidates for the state Assembly, National Assembly. It is the person you want in your constituency that I will okay.
“Don’t allow anybody to deceive you that I have endorsed any candidate,” he said.
The Senate President implored party leaders and elders not to drop his name to impose unpopular candidates.
“All of us will collectively choose who becomes the next governor. We will ensure that there is no faction, but one PDP.
“We will ensure that meetings in the local government areas take place in one venue. And we will all work together for the interest of the party,” he said.
Meanwhile, the PDP has demanded the arrest and trial of the leaders of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association, over the association’s comment on plot to forcefully remove the President of the Senate, Senator Bukola Saraki.
PDP made the call in a Statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan on Wednesday in Abuja.
Ologbondiyan said such “unguarded statement” echoed the threats by the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Presidency, to force out Saraki, from office, describing it as ominous and revealing.
He alleged that it had also been the same group that was being used to stoke division and create violent crisis that had resulted into daily blood lettings in various parts of the country.
He wondered how the association had now become the fourth arm of government that could determine when and how to forcefully remove the number three citizen, the President of the Senate.
He said it was in the light of these treasonable and inciting utterances by Miyetti Allah, PDP demanded that President Muhammadu Buhari, should within the next 24 hours, order the arrest and commence immediate trial of the leadership of the group.
“Finally, the PDP is aware that Miyetti Allah does not represent the views and interests of the vast majority of cattle breeders or even any ethnic group in the country.
“We therefore urge all good spirited Nigerians to rise in condemnation of the actions and utterances of these misguided elements, who are being used to attempt a constitutional breach that portends grave danger to national cohesion and our hard earned democracy. “
