The Presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC), Omoyele Sowore, has told the All Progressive Congress (APC) flag bearer, Bola Tinubu, that the latter cannot run for the nation’s presidency in absentia.
Sowore made this known in a video released during the signing of the peace accord ahead of the 2023 elections in Abuja on Thursday where Tinubu was absent.
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In a verbal exchange with Tinubu’s running mate, Senator Kashim Shettima, who represented his principal at the occasion, Sowore questioned why he would sit at a privileged position when his party’s presidential candidate was absent.
Sowore said “It’s the same position I have with people sitting in front. I confronted him [Shettiman] why is he sitting here when Tinubu is not here. If I was sitting there I will not stand up for him because Tinubu is the one who is supposed to be here. You can’t be running Nigeria for presidency in absentia.”
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Sowore, talking to Major Hamza Al-Mustapha (retd), a former Nigerian Army major and intelligence officer who served as Chief Security Officer to General Sani Abacha, who was also at the occasion said he stood for the truth.
Al-Mustapha had said “You know the way I was yesterday? Between realism and truth are two different words. I stood for what I stood for yesterday and tomorrow.”
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“It’s the same things I stood for. I am part of the truth. I stood [for the truth] because I was a Students’ Union leader when you guys were rampaging the country,” Sowore said in response to Al-Mustapha’s comment that he should know the difference between truth and reality.
There have been speculations surrounding Tinubu’s fitness for the nation’s top job, amid insinuations that the septuagenarian has yet again left Nigeria’s shores to tend to his health and visible frailty on the political stomp.