Ahead of the 2019 general elections, some support groups of the president, Muhammadu Buhari, have declared support for candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, Atiku Abubakar.
At a briefing in Gudu district of Abuja yesterday, the groups said their decision to dump Buhari and All Progressives Congress, APC, was due to “marginalisation and deliberate impoverishment.”
The briefing was addressed on behalf of the groups by Yusuf Ardo, National Coordinator of Grassroots Mobilisers for Buhari, GMB.
However, spokesperson of Buhari Campaign Organisation, Festus Keyamo(SAN), in a swift reaction, said people were free to make their choices, adding that they also receive hundreds of decampees daily.
He said: “Every day, we receive hundreds of people who dump PDP and are willing to work for us.
“I doubt if they are genuine Buhari supporters because the name does not ring a bell,’’ Keyamo stated.
He said since many mercenaries were looking for their daily bread, he would not be surprised to see such development.
However, Ardo said the Grassroots Mobilisers for Buhari was a political pressure group registered in 2015 with the relevant government agency, with national, zonal, states, local government areas, wards and polling units leadership.
He claimed his group had over “five million registered members” across Nigeria that mobilised Nigerians from all works of life through organisation of Town Hall meetings, community by community to sensitise people at the grassroots for the actualisation of Buhari’s presidential ambition in 2015.
“We toured the country and campaigned for the emergence of the current APC-led Federal Government.
“This forum coordinated all support groups for APC and championed grassroots mobilisations of Nigerians.”
He attributed their decision to support Abubakar to the “failure” of Buhari.
“Sequel to the foregoing, we are sad, that the government we put in place has failed and continues to fail our people; we cannot continue to reinforce failures.”
Mr Ardo criticized the president for not having youth in his cabinet.