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2023 PRESIDENCY: Northern coalition opposes Arewa youths, drums support for southern candidates

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A coalition of political and civil society groups under the aegies of the Arewa Coalition for Rotational Presidency (ACRP), has opposed the stance of the Arewa Youths Consultative Forum (AYCF) over a suitable candidate for the 2023 presidency.

While the AYCF are in support of a President from the North to take over from President Muhammadu Buhari, the ACRP is in support of a President from the South come 2023.

The Arewa Youths had, at a press conference in Kaduna on Monday, dared the two frontline parties in the country, All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to field candidates who are not northerners, saying they would lose the votes of northerners, especially the youths.

The President of the AYCF, Alhaji Yerima Shettima, who addressed the press briefing, advised the two parties not to zone their 2023 presidential tickets to the south, vowing that they would be shocked with the outcome from the North.

However, the ACRP, on its part, has
urged all aspirants for the 2023 presidential election from the north to drop their ambitions and support aspirants from the south.

The group, at a press conference held in Abuja on Saturday, said it was strongly against aspirants from the North contesting for the presidency in 2023, saying it would be unfair for North to retain power after eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari.

READ ALSO: Northern coalition tells Buhari to return Nigeria to days of Jonathan

In a communique jointly signed by its Chairman and Secretary-General, Comrade Abdullahi Biu and Hamza Malumfashi, respectively, the ACRP vowed to “practically rise and mobilize against all presidential candidates from the North, who dare to contest under any political party during the general elections.”

The group said it would only be fair and just for the Presidency to go to the South after President Buhari who would have spent eight years in power.

“The current brewing political tension stirred by the call for power shift to south by Southern Governors and groups can only be doused when all stakeholders from the North, Governors and political parties, agree to the Presidency.

“In the interest of peace, equity and justice, more so, that the North has been in power for eight years now, the idea of the North even contesting for the highly exalted position of the President should be immediately jettisoned.

“All those who have pick nomination forms, especially from the People’s Democratic Party, should step down if there are true democrats.

“As a group of democrats from the 19 Northern states, we strongly believe in the principle of equity and fairness as a panacea for peace and progress and, thus our resolve to support rotation of power to our brothers in the southern region.

“It is against this background that we are advising all the political parties, especially the two major parties, APC and PDP, to field only Southern candidates,” the ACRP said in the communique.

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