An elder stateman, Tanka Yakassai has said it is erroneous to believe President Muhammad Buhari is the North consensus candidate as other aspirants have also signified interests.
While granting interview to The Sun, Yakassai said the North is on a mission to produce a more credible and acceptable presidential candidate from the region and efforts are geared towards this through a movement comprising mainly retired military chiefs, former governors, ex-ministers, senators and other top public office holders.
He said among other things, “I don’t know how you came to that conclusion, because other aspirants are expressing their wish to contest, people are still aspiring.
“The question of someone becoming a consensus candidate for a whole area of the north does not make sense.
“In addition, the rule of multi party democracy, there will never be a consensus candidate anywhere in Nigeria or anywhere multi party is practiced. Otherwise the merit of multi party democracy is defeated.
“And that does not go with democracy if you come up with a consensus candidate. Consensus candidate means killing competition. Competition is the livewire of democracy.
“Those who are elected particularly at the presidential level owe their allegiance to the people who got them into office and not the voters. We want to change that narrative.
“We want the election in the future to be based on programme and manifesto, we want the election to be credible and through a verifiable process that would change the life of the people for the better.
“To do that, you have to come with your own programme and your own manifesto, not a manifesto written by hired Professors or Doctors because of their command of English that can impress people.
“Our focus is election related matters. We want our votes to have values. After an aspirant is selected, the person can now face us.”