A former Governor of Ogun State and chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Olusegun Osoba, has said that the party has a gentleman agreement that the presidency should shift to the South after President Muhammadu Buhari’s tenure elapses in 2023. Speaking on Arise TV’s programme, The Morning Show, yesterday, Osoba said though zoning is not in the constitution of the party, there was a conventional understanding in 2013 during APC’s formation that the presidency should rotate between the North and the South.
Osoba also said that the APC National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, has the right to contest the 2023 presidency as the party has not zeroed in on any individual for its ticket. His words: “I was the chairman of the Constitution Drafting Committee of APC during formation and there was a clear gentlemanly agreement that the northern part of the country should produce the president when we did the merger in 2013 and the chairman of the party would then come from the South. We’ve had the president for six and half years from the North and he will be there for eight years until 2023.
Of course, at the end of the tenure of President Buhari, the gentleman agreement is that the presidency should come to the South.” The former governor, who maintained that the three geopolitical zones in the South – South-West, South-East and South-outh – should be allowed to present the next president of the country, advised the respective zones to put up candidates for the party’s presidential primary.
According to him, “that was the gentlemanly understanding that we reached when we were doing the merger arrangement.” On Tinubu, he said: “Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, as an individual, has the right to put himself forward. We have not zeroed in on an individual. Zeroing in on any individual will destroy our efforts now, but Tinubu has a right to pursue his own agenda.” Osoba also urged the people of the South-West to unite and put their house in order to achieve success in the next presidential election.