2023: No evidence Atiku promised anybody VP slot – PDP Chieftain slam’s Wike

Atiku Abubakar, the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) presidential nominee, did not promise to make Governor Wike of Rivers State his running mate, according to Muazu Magaji, a former PDP candidate for governor in Kano State.

“I would like to stress once more that there is no proof Atiku promised Wike the vice-presidency.

Governor Wike is a stakeholder and everybody that has importance is important in this delivery,” Magaji said on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Thursday.

“This must be understood to not be personal property. I keep bringing up the establishment. No manner is possible. We have no supporting evidence.

Nobody will claim to have had a private encounter (with a presidential candidate) during which he said, “Look, I’ll offer you my vice-president.”

The vice president pick is a prerogative of the candidate and it is a process… One of the fears is that if an individual will be going behind a structure

An institution within the system to get what he wants, then, we cannot trust the same individual as a principal actor on the commonwealth of the Nigerian people,” he added.

Wike and Atiku had fallen apart after the latter won the PDP presidential primary in May.

There were reports that a committee considered Wike as Atiku’s running mate but the presidential candidate settled for Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State, a move that irked the Rivers governor.

Wike and his allies including serving and former governors in the party have insisted that Iyorchia Ayu should quit as the party’s national chairman for a southerner.

READ ALSO: 2023 Poll: South-East will get presidency after Atiku – Emeka Ihedioha tells Igbo elders

Even Atiku candidacy is against PDP’s constitution – George say Ayu must go

They contended that Ayu had previously pledged to quit should someone from his region win the PDP’s nomination for president, and that therefore only southerners could serve as the party’s national chairman and presidential flagbearer.

Ayu vowed that he would complete his four-year tenure, but the dispute has ripped the party apart.

Following the incident, Wike and his supporters resigned from the party’s presidential campaign council and did not participate in the Wednesday kickoff of the campaign.