The Director-General of the Goodluck Jonathan Campaign Organisation in 2015, Senator Ahmadu Ali, has also been named as the protem chairman of the coalition.
The Director, Media and Public Communications, Mr. Akin Osuntokun, confirmed these during an interview with our correspondent on Saturday. Osuntokun said, “We are going to inaugurate zonal offices in the six geo-political zones this week. We have done the one for Abuja already. We will subsequently launch campaigns in the 36 states of the federation.”
On why most of the personalities in the organisation are from southern Nigeria, Osuntokun said, “That is not correct. Ahmadu Ali is the protem chairman to begin with. Don’t forget that the coalition has just been launched and there will be more developments as time goes on.”
When asked why the coalition was accepting old politicians despite preaching a shift of power to the youth, Osuntokun said there was a need to blend the old and the new. He said, “For any organisation to survive, no matter your ambition, it has to be a blend of the old and the new.
The coalition will be depriving itself of a source of strength if you rule out completely the enlistment of significant political actors who have been on the stage for a while. “Also, not all of them are tainted. There are quite a number of them that have their integrity intact.
In politics, you don’t drive people away as long as they subscribe to the ideology of your organisation.” The former Managing Director of the News Agency of Nigeria said all persons were welcome in the party. When asked if the National Leader of the All progressives Congress, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, would be welcome into the coalition, he said, “If Tinubu says he is joining, that will be a big boost to the organisation because he is a big fish. He has immense political value in terms of followership and boots on the ground.”
He refused to mention the names of the 13 governors said to be planning to join the coalition, saying it wouldn’t be strategic for him to do so.
Reacting to whether the collation would merge with the APC or the Peoples Democratic Party ahead of the 2019 elections, Oshuntokun said both political parties had lost the confidence of Nigerians and it was unlikely that the coalition would endorse either of the two. Osuntokun, however, stated that it was possible for the coalition to register as a political party and contest independently.
Asked if a former Governor of Osun State, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, would resign as Chairman of the National Identity Management Commission in order to prove his loyalty to the coalition, Osuntokun said there was no need for him to do so.
He added that President Muhammadu Buhari was free to sack him but there was no need for Oyinlola to resign since the appointment was not the exclusive preserve of APC members. Osuntokun added, “He is a Nigerian citizen and that is all a person needs to be given a public appointment. If I were in his position, I would leave it to the President to decide.
“There is no law that says it is only members of the President’s party who should be appointed to public office. Until the President decides otherwise, he can remain there and if I were him, I would not resign because I have done nothing wrong.”
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