2023: Why Buhari, Northern Region Should Support Tinubu – Shettima

Former Governor of Borno State, Senator Kashim Shettima, has revealed why President Muhammadu Buhari and the Northern region should support the presidential ambition of Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

In an interview with Daily Trust over the weekend, Shettima said President Buhari and the Northern leaders should reciprocate the gesture extended by the national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the last seven years.

Shettima said the former Lagos governor supported President Buhari through thick and thin during the 2015 and 2019 elections and also supported other chieftains of the ruling party.

The former governor, a vocal supporter of the Tinubu presidency in 2023, opined that Tinubu was first among equal and should be given the right of first refusal.

He said: “I will rather come out bluntly and take a firm position on what is right, taking into consideration, our history of leadership in northern Nigeria than sit on the fence and wait for the direction the wind will blow. This is fundamentally the reason I came out to endorse Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

“When he supported us he could have stood for the presidency, but he didn’t. He supported President Buhari through thick and thin, and one good turn always deserves another. There is a minimum threshold below which we should not operate as politicians; it should not be a case of anything goes. That minimal threshold requires that we should reciprocate in kind.”

Shettima stated that he is supporting Tinubu to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari in 2023 based on the principle of payback and consistency.

He added: “My political association with Asiwaju Tinubu, which I am very proud of, is purely on the principle of payback and consistency. In the build-up to my 2015 re-election, soon after the APC was formed, I and those associated with me came under a serious political battle for the control of the party in Borno.

“At a point, Asiwaju invited all colliding parties to Lagos, right in front of my opponents, including one of them that was far closer to Asiwaju than me. Asiwaju supported me.

“He stood by us, and with his support; we were firmly in control of the APC in Borno State through the backing of the party’s national headquarters.

“Again, ahead of 2019, after the emergence of Professor Zulum as a candidate, Asiwaju resisted pressures from some quarters to have Zulum replaced.

“He openly raised the hands of Zulum, which he did not do for others. President Buhari did the same by honouring us and publicly endorsing Zulum amid litigation. These two endorsements significantly enabled us to consolidate our grip and match to victory at the polls. And you see, we needed to be consistent.

“Asiwaju played a key role in the formation and victory of the APC. For us in Borno, if we were to abandon, how would anyone trust us as northerners? In Borno, we stand by those who stand by us. This is our kind of politics and philosophy.”