Adams Oshiomhole, the All Progressives Congress (APC) National Chairman, has said
President Muhammadu Buhari is “too mild.”
He noted that with his emergence as the party’s presidential candidate for the 2019 election, APC was set to especially, engage the opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) on issue-based campaign.
Oshiomhole stated this in his address of welcome at the party’s National Presidential Convention, which ended in the early hours of Sunday.
President Buhari pulled a total of 14,842,072 votes at the party’s recent presidential primaries held across the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) as announced by Dr Kayode Fayemi, Ekiti State Governor-elect.
Oshiomhole mocked former President Goodluck Jonathan, saying only he ran for his party’s ticket in 2015.
Oshiomhole said, “Unlike the other party, which printed only one presidential form and came up with 2 million signatures from unverified individuals in 2015, the APC chose a more democratic process, using the direct primary method which gave all registered party members a true sense of participation”.
He said that the APC would scrutinise the records of whoever the opposition party, especially the PDP, brought up as its presidential candidate for the 2019 election.
This, he said, would be done with a view to bringing their past deeds to the public to enable them to make good choice.
“The other party is choosing its candidate in Port-Harcourt, we will look at the records of the opponent, we will look at his pedigree, we will challenge them on their track records,” he said.
The National Chairman, however, dismissed claims by members of the opposition PDP that the Federal Government was being selective in its anti-graft war.
He also said that the complaints by opposition figures that the President Buhari-led administration was being heavy-handed should be ignored.
According to him, the current government was being too mild compared to past administration, which he said always harassed and intimidated those in the opposition, saying that he was a victim of such harassment.
“As a sitting governor then, I was denied the use of a public airport.
“Mr. President, sometimes I feel you are too mild. I was under threat of impeachment; I had to remove the roof of my State House of Assembly in order to survive.”
Mocking former president Olusegun Obasanjo, Oshiomhole stated: “One of your predecessors used seven people to remove a sitting Governor. I am, however, not in anyway suggesting that you do the same,” Oshiomhole said.
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