APC running mate: Christian groups disagree with Babachir, Dogara, others

The Christian groups in the North under the aegis of Arewa Coalition for Good Governance havee said that the hardline position of former Secretary to the Federal Government; Lawal Babachir, former Speaker Dogara and Senator Ishaku Abbo over the issue of the All Progressives Congress, APC’s choice of Muslim-Muslim ticket was based on selfish interest.

Telescope.ng reports that the group said their anger was premised on the fact that none of them was picked as a running mate and not the issue of the Muslim-Muslim Ticket as was being projected.

It said: “At a time when all critical stakeholders of APC are supposed to be working for unity and progress of the party during the forthcoming 2023 general elections, they have decided to deploy religious sentiments as a weapon of war to discourage Christians from Tinubu/Shettima.”

In a statement signed by the leader of the coalition, Elder Peter Sati Auta, they said that, ”Nigerians , especially the electorate are wise enough to know that whipping religious sentiment against any candidate is not the solution to the challenges of insecurity; dwindling economy, Insurgency, high unemployment rate, bad governance and other problems militating against progress and development of Nigeria.”

While stating that the Holy Bible gave Christians the mandate to pray for leaders, they said that “anything out of this is not only unhealthy, but retrogressive.

“This amongst several reasons is why as Christian leaders in various churches, we decided to come out and speak against the divisive move by our brothers to create a religious crack in the polity ahead of the 2023 elections.”

“Instead of holding nocturnal meetings to fight the issue of Muslim -Muslim Ticket, we expected them to spend energy on talking about how to contribute their quota in finding solutions to a plethora of above mentioned problems that over the past twenty years have served as cog in the wheel of progress.”

“Babachir and Dogara could be the ones working to overheat the polity and destroy the same party that gave them platform of political relevance. We hold the view that this is nothing but mere selfish interest of the spent forces, which should be rejected outrightly.

“Everyone knows that both former Lagos state governor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and former Borno governor, Alhaji Kashim Shettima are not religious bigots, so the earlier they know that the idea of whipping religious sentiments against then won’t work.

“It is in the public domain that Tinubu and Shettima helped a good number of Christians during their days as governors of Lagos and Borno. Where were they, when the heavy campaign of calumny of being a “religious bigot” was muted against Buhari? Of course, some of them supported him to win and were later compensated with appointments. Even with all the unprintable names, Buhari was called, they worked for him.”

“We are urging Christians to shun Babachir ,Dogara and Senator Abbo’s divisive strategies and vote candidates of their choice regardless of religion and tribal backgroundsThe most important thing for Nigerians now is to come out during the election and vote good leaders based on merit ; experience and records of performance.”