PDP will not produce a ‘northern president’ in 2019, says Turaki

Former Minister for Special Duties under the immediate past President Goodluck Jonathan, Tanimu Turaki, has stated that the Peoples Democratic Party will not produce a northern president in 2019.

Turaki said, rather, the party would field someone who would carry everybody along.

The ex-minister in an interview with Premium Times said the current government, under the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari does not have regard for other parts of the country.

According to him, the former ruling party is looking for men and women of integrity, people that will be the new face of PDP.

He said, “We want people that will not have been part of the so-called impunity that have played out in the party before. People that will raise that hope among Nigerians. People that will inspire members of the party to go that extra mile in canvassing support for the party. So that at the end of the day, we will come up with men and women of proven integrity that will stand anywhere and that would be the first step that PDP will use in telling Nigerians that we have changed, this is a new PDP.

“By the time we get to the point of selecting our party’s presidential candidate, I assure you that Nigerians will be proud of PDP. We will come out with a man or woman of high integrity, somebody who is unassailable, whose integrity is beyond reproach, somebody that Nigerians will have confidence that even though we are going to bring a northerner, we are not going to bring a northern president.

“I want to assure Nigerians and it is important that Nigerians take note of this. Even though the presidency has been zoned to the north, we are not going to give Nigerians a northern president, we are going to give Nigerians, a Nigerian president of northern extraction. Somebody when he thinks, he thinks Nigeria; when he wants to act, he acts Nigeria. Somebody when he wants to move, he moves Nigeria.

“Not somebody that will begin to discriminate among Nigerians, not somebody who will want to treat Nigerians differently on the basis of their support, their thinking, their beliefs and attitude. Somebody who will build strong bridges of friendship across the divide. We will bring somebody who is a unifier.”