2023: Nigeria needs strong leader as president — Wike

Rivers State governor, Mr Nyesom Wike, who is also a presidential aspirant on the platform of the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), on Saturday said Nigeria needed a strong leader and not a lily liver individual as president, come 2023. He urged his party to field a candidate who can win the seat for it in the coming General Election.

Wike made this assertion in Lagos while addressing the party delegates in Ikeja area of the state, saying that the question that should be of utmost concern to members should be who would be fielded for the presidential poll that will win the seat for the party, warning that PDP would be doomed should it lose the next election.

The PDP presidential aspirant, who spoke at the event attended by the Oyo State governor, Engr Seyi Makinde; former governors Ibrahim Dankwabo, Donald Duke and Ayodele Fayose; Mr Muhammed Adoke, as well as Senator Philip Aduda, Senator Kofoworola Bucknor-Akerele, Chief Aduke Maina, Senator Hosea Agboola, Senator Lee Maeba, Senator Sulaiman Nasir, Mrs Rolly Olabode George, Hon. Philip Aivoji, among others, said it was about who had the capacity to face the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the coming polls.

Wike, who noted that APC had failed the country, in areas of security, and economy, among others, said the energy in him to serve the country was too strong, adding that those in the ruling party feared him a lot and would never joke with him.

This was just as vowed that he would do the right thing to better the country, and would never fail if given the party’s ticket and eventually got elected as the next president.

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“What should be in the mind of everyone now is, who can win for PDP? It is about who has the capacity to face APC?  So when people tell you this and that, we agree. Can you win an election? Will you run away after collecting the ticket?

“We would show APC pepper. Just give me the ticket, APC is surely afraid of me,” he said.

“I have been tested in terms of performance, that’s why they call me talk and do. This man standing before you is Mr Project. We are going to replicate that at the Federal level if voted as president.

“But there must be security, people are being killed, people are being kidnapped. There is insecurity in the land, that’s the only project APC has given to the country,” he added.

The presidential hopeful maintained that, come 2023, he would be the country’s president, saying he was not gunning for the vice-president’s seat. He added that Nigeria needed a president everyone could predict.

“We need the president we can predict. I don’t know how. I can’t change. I am sorry. What we are looking for now is a man who can win for PDP.

“I know APC very well. Allow me delegates, let me go and serve as president,” he said.

“I depend on South-West, if South-West gives their votes, then I have won,” he added.

Wike, however, pleaded with the Lagos State chapter of PDP to put a stop to the division, which he said had long robbed the party of victory in the state, charging to also give respect to elders of the party in the state, particularly the former Deputy National Chairman of PDP, Chief Olabode George, who, according to him, “has paid he due to the party.”

“I beg you to work together. If you do that, I would work with you to win this election in Lagos,” he said.

Speaking earlier, a former governor of Gombe State, Dankwabo, described Wike as a trusted leader and a very courageous person, who had stood for the party, “when it was tough for the party when others ran away.

“In all, Wike has excelled, Rivers has changed. The state has been restored. I will tell you, vote him in office, and he will secure this country,” he said.

Also speaking, Governor Makinde applauded the PDP presidential hopeful, saying that he had very well for the party both at the national and state levels, expressing hope that Wike would be elected the country’s next president, come 2023.