ABUJA – Barely 24 hours to the Presidential elections, the presidential candidate of Alliance for Democracy, AD, Rafiu Salau has stepped down for his counter-part in the All Progressives Congress, APC, Gen. Mohammadu Buhari.
At a press conference in Abuja on Thursday where he announced the development, Salau said he took the decision to prevent Nigerian from becoming a one party State, urging the supporters of his party and indeed, Nigerians to vote for Buhari.
He said that vote out the ruling Peoples Democratic party, PDP.
Salau also told the people to eschew religion and tribe and vote for competence.
“Don’t give any other party your mandate to stay in power for more than 16 years. You deserve another team of politicians with different manifestos and ideology to serve you.
“As voters, don’t listen to those who based their campaign on tribe and religion. In politics, the difference is ideology. Religion or tribe has nothing to do with pure democracy. Those who see your vote by tribe or religious influence have no program to implement for the greatness of the country.
“The democracy is yours. Control it so that no party will take it away from you. PDP has been in power for 16 years and It has tried its best.
“No matter good the performance of PDP for the past 16 years, you need to vote for another party before you can know that you will always get a better performance when you create competition among the parties.
“All of you, the 68 million voters shoukd vote for General Buhari, the candidate of the democrats who will bring change. Vote APC. Show the world that you are in control of your democracy”, Salau said.
Responding, the National Chairman of APC, Chief John Oyegun thanked the AD candidate who was equally the national chairman of the party, said that Buhari was better qualified to lead Nigeria.
“By identifying with Buhari, it means that you must have to look at our programmes and our candidate and judge. You can see they are people-oriented. Our candidate is more qualified to lead the country.
“I am asking people to judge the administration of President Jonathan whether they really deserve any support of any kind. The PDP government has failed in every aspect. The main business of government today is corruption”, Oyegun said.
