FORMER Kano State governor, Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau, yesterday took a critical appraisal of the current administration and asked Nigerians to brace up to the challenges of unseating President Goodluck Jonathan come 2015.
Shekarau spoke just as the Interim National Chairman of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Chief Bisi Akande, gave indications that the substantive national leaders of the party will likely emerge in January 2014.
Shekarau spoke at a conference organised by the Movement for Better Future and Democratic Emancipation Movement in Kaduna.
He said Jonathan has failed woefully and does not deserve reelection in 2015.
The former governor, who was a member of the merger committee of the APC, said: “My assessment is that the government is a total failure. It is not about projects as I have said but about the wellbeing and safety of the people”.
On the way forward, he said: “The only answer to this failure is to get the right people to do it. It is not about the rules.
“The electorates have a very big role to play because people must have a change. That is why we said that this change we are talking about in the APC is not just change of government but change of attitude and people must vote according to their belief and consciousness of accepting who will do the right thing.”
On the imperatives of the merger, he said: “We have never had merger before now but alliances and government of national unity.
“There has never been merger. We have melted into one and I think that was the biggest achievement and that is what gives Nigeria a lot of hope.”
He assured: “There is not going be any crisis because we are going to be fair to all. Everybody in the party will be free to aspire to any office.
“But I think that no matter the number of people who aspire, we are going to come out clean from it.”
Akande, who spoke through the Interim Deputy National Secretary of the party, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, disclosed that the guidelines for the harmonisation of the three parties that constitute the APC at the state levels have been released.
The committee, he said, will be announced next week.
He warned that the harmonisation committees are not executive committees but expected to hold forte for about two months and register members for the party before commencement of congresses to elect substantive leaders.
Akande assured: “Nobody will take the APC and put it in his pocket. We will have no godfathers in this party.
“All those who want to be godfathers should go the PDP. I want to appeal to you to register enmasse, pick the right people and vote for them as leaders.”
