Abdullahi Sule, governor of Nasarawa, says President Muhammadu Buhari is not planning to foist a presidential candidate on the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Sule made this known on Tuesday during an interview on Channels Television.
On Tuesday, Buhari met with APC governors at the presidential villa.
During the meeting, Buhari told the governors that the party’s presidential candidate must be someone who is able to connect with Nigerians.
“Our objective must be the victory of our party and our choice of candidate must be someone who would give the Nigerian masses a sense of victory and confidence even before the elections,” the president said.
Asked if he thinks Buhari will impose a candidate, the Nasarawa governor said the president will not consult stakeholders before the primary if he wanted to impose a candidate.
He added that he felt Buhari wanted them to think of and support the appropriate person, noting that the president didn’t mention a name.
“It looks to me that everyone should collectively think and come up with the right person,” he said.
“I do not think there will be a situation where the president will just say ‘this is the person; take him or leave him’.
“If it is going to be that, he won’t invite people for consultations and the rest of that.”
Speaking about what the president told the governors, Sule said Buhari discussed with them about the expected qualities of the party’s presidential candidate.
“The president clearly mentioned that our candidate who will be selected must be someone acceptable to Nigerians — someone who understands what APC is all about and after,” he said.
“He mentioned clearly that it is somebody that would go to all parts of the country and be accepted. We must bring someone who can win the election and sustain what the APC has done. That is the exact definition of what the president said.
“If you are looking for a name, the president didn’t mention a name, and neither did anybody mention a name.
“He told us about his dreams of who will be president. The president said: ‘my dream of who will be the next president is this and I’m going to consult with other stakeholders, not just the governors, the aspirants themselves, and at the end of the day, we must remain a united party’. I think that is just the dream of the president.”