Influential chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo state, has reacted to the decalaration of President Buhari to run for a second term.
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earlier reported that President Muhammadu, on Monday in Abuja, declared his intention to seek re-election in 2019, during a closed-door meeting of the National Executive Committee of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
In a swift reaction to the president's reaction, the Chairman of the Progressive Governors’ Forum and Governor of Imo state, Rochas Okorocha, said that President Muhammadu Buhari’s declaration for second term will silence the ‘noise’ of the opposition parties.
He also described the President’s declaration as a “patriotic response to the clarion call of Nigerians of goodwill on him to lead the country for another four years”.
According to The Nation, the influential politician prided that the All Progressives Congress (APC) does not owe any apologies for its first four years under the Presidency of Buhari, unlike the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) that looted the country for sixteen years only to apologize.
The governor in a statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary, Sam Onwuemeodo, also noted that, “the declaration of the President to go for Second tenure would also go a long way to reduce the noise of the opposition and take care of the idiosyncrasies of certain elements in the system”.
He observed that the President has done well to deserve a second tenure, adding that “those who had wanted to blackmail him out of going for another term can now find other meaningful things to keep themselves busy”
The governor expressed optimism that the President “would largely garner more votes in 2019 than he had done in 2015 because most Nigerians, including people of the Southeast have seen that he meant well for the nation and the citizenry”.
Okorocha added further that “the APC has no apology to make because it has done wonderfully well considering the magnitude of the rot it met on ground in 2015”.
He also noted that “the antenna of the opposition in the Country will finally be lowered when the campaigns begin and the Party will be showing Nigerians its achievements in the states under its control and at the Federal level”.
The Imo governor said “when a political party had admitted that the government it ran was a huge failure and then apologized, such scenario goes with restitution and not with reward”.
He urged APC members across the nation to close ranks for the victory of the party at all levels in 2019.