Why we zoned gov ticket to Lagos East —APC •Ambode may be picked

 


















The All Progressives Congress (APC), on Wednesday, zoned its governorship ticket to Lagos East senatorial district.
Spokesperson of the party, Joe Igbokwe, confirmed the development to the Nigerian Tribune.
The decision was taken at a meeting at its secretariat on ACME Road, Ikeja.
National leader of the party, Senator Bola Tinubu, he said, announced the decision at the meeting.
Igbokwe confirmed same, but denied that it was his (Tinubu) unilateral decision as being alleged by governorship aspirants from other zones.
A frontline aspirant from Lagos West senatorial district told the Nigerian Tribune that the decision to shut other aspirants out would spell doom for the ruling party in the state.
Nigerian Tribune reliably learnt that the zoning decision had got some heavyweight
aspirants and their supporters looking elsewhere.
Opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP) were said to be the next destinations of the disgruntled aspirants.
A leading aspirant told the Nigerian Tribune that mass defection from APC would be witnessed in weeks ahead.
The aspirant insisted that the zoning decision was a unilateral decision by the party leader, because he already allegedly had a candidate in a former permanent secretary/Accountant-General of the state, Mr Akinwunmi Ambode.
Igbokwe, however, denied the alleged anointment.
According to him, “I was at the meeting. Na lie (Ambode’s endorsement). But it is a reality that Tinubu made it known in today’s meeting that the governorship ticket of the party is going to the East senatorial zone.”
When probed if that was not a one-man show, Igbokwe explained that “though he (Tinubu) was the person that announced the zoning decision at the meeting, the decision came after a lot of consultations.
“When you have about 30, 50 people deciding on something, all of them cannot come out to announce it, a person must talk on behalf of others, which was what he did today (yesterday).”
Tinubu contested and won the governorship as a representative of Lagos West while the incumbent, Governor Babatunde Fashola, is from Lagos Central.
When probed further on Ambode’s alleged endorsement, he said “we are not yet at that point. When it is time, we would tell you our candidate.”