| Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar has alerted that President Olusegun Obasanjo is not ready to leave office in May this year. Speaking in the Housa service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) monitored in Kaduna yesterday, Atiku urged Nigerians to be patient and assist the president in packing his bags and baggage to his Otta farm when his tenure expires on May 29, 2007. The Vice president who described Obasanjo as a “lawless public officer” said the alliance between the All Nigeria People�s Party (ANPP) and Action Alliance (AC) was to ensure that Obasanjo leaves office at the expiration of his tenure. �Nigerians should remember that the President does not obey court orders or the rule of law. It is not a new thing for him to disobey court orders. �But this is gradually coming to an end. Since we have been patient with him for eight years, what is left now is about two to three months. All we need to do is to assist him pack his bags and baggage to his farm� he added. Atiku who also said there was no way the feud between him and the President would affect his chances at the polls stressed that there was nothing Obasanjo had not done to scuttle his ambition. �There is nothing he (Obasanjo) has not done to dampen my heart or to deprive me from contesting but God did not allow him. Whatever he would do to stop me from contesting, not only in PDP but in other Parties� �I am determined that the election is not his own but is for the people. I will contest by all means;� he added. Commenting on the AC/ANPP alliance, he said that there were three main reasons why the two parties started working together. �Firstly, we are in alliance to ensure that they conduct elections and it is not stolen from Nigerians. Secondly, it is to ensure that he (Obasanjo) leaves office at the expiration of his tenure�. According to the Vice President, the two parties would achieve their objective by forming an alliance in fielding candidates in states, the National Assembly and also at the federation�. His words: �But if the first and second are not achieved, the third one will not be possible. Therefore, people should understand that the alliance is not for fielding candidates alone�. On whether or not he would step down for the ANPP Presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari, Atiku said the two parties had not reached the stage where one person would step down for the other. |
Jan282007