APC veers towards zoning vice presidency to the northeast and the senate president to the southeast

ALL Progressives Congress (APC) leaders are drawing up zoning plans ahead of the 2023 presidential elections that will see the party's vice presidential candidate come from the northeast geo-political zone while the senate president will be an Igbo from the southeast.

With former Lagos State governor Asiwaju Bola Tinubu emerging as the APC's presidential candidate last week, the party has spent the last few days desperately searching for a running mate. It now appears that they are ready to unveil the preferred candidate on Wednesday after the APC governors and other stakeholders had agreed that the northeast should produce the vice-presidential candidate.

Apparently, the party believes the vice president should come from the northeast, while the position of the senate president would go to the southeast, while the northwest would produce the speaker of the House of Representatives. Among the leading candidates for vice president from the northeast are Boss Mustapha, the secretary to the federal government and Yakubu Dogara, the former speaker of the House of Representatives.

An associate of Tinubu and Lagos Vice Chairman (Central) of the APC, Hakeem Bamgbala, in an interview with The PUNCH, confirmed that the presidential candidate would unveil his running mate in the next two or three days.

APC national publicity secretary, Felix Morka, said: “We are not in any kind of time competition with the PDP to make that announcement. Again, the choice of vice president will be made through consultation with the party and relevant stakeholders, so Nigerians should be patient as they decide on the candidate and the part of the country he is coming from.

“I am sure you know that since the convention, the presidential candidate of the APC, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, has been on the road reaching out to and meeting all the aspirants and co-contestants at the primary. In doing so, he is rallying them back to the base in readiness for the upcoming campaign.”

Hon Alhassan Ado-Doguwa, the majority leader of the House of Representatives, added: “I want to say we, as a National Assembly caucus, do not have to champion or advocate any separate cause to ask or to influence the choice of the vice-president. The governors have honestly shown leadership as they provided direction and exhibited a spirit of selflessness, which hitherto was lacking.

"We now have unwavering confidence in the body of the Progressives Governors Forum. We are eminent members of the National Executive Committee, the national caucus and the presidential tripartite committee of our great party, where we offer our bits of advice and help to provide direction.”