Seven northern governors, elected under the platform of the All Progressives Congress, APC, visited President Muhammadu Buhari at the Aso Rock Presidential Villa in Abuja on Friday and declared that they wanted him to get a second term.
They were Governors Nasir El-rufai (Kaduna State), Abdullahi Ganduje (Kano), Yahaya Bello (Kogi), Simon Lalong (Plateau), Jubrilla Bindow (Adamawa), Ibrahim Geidam (Yobe) and Abubakar Bello (Niger).
The governors went into a closed-door meeting with President Buhari after joining him in observing juma’at service at the State House mosque.
Addressing State House correspondents after the meeting which lasted about two hours, El-rufai said they wanted President Buhari to seek reelection and continue to run Nigeria in the right direction.
Asked what his response would be to those who might say their visit was about 2019 elections, El-rufai said: ‘We are politicians, and those of us you see here want the president to contest the 2019 election, we have no apologies for that.
“We believe in Mr. President, we want him to continue running the country in the right direction. People can speculate about 2019, we have no apologies.
“Whether they are right or wrong is besides the point. Everybody is entitled to his own opinion, but as governors, and most of us here, with the exception of Yobe governor, are first-time governors. We are interested in the continuity and stability and we want the president to continue with that.
“Like our leader, the governor of Kano said, we just happen to be here by coincidence, and we went to pray and decided to felicitate with the president and we feel satisfied that anytime we see him, he is getting better and better.”
Earlier, Ganduje had noted that he and his colleagues went to the Presidential Villa separately, “not for any purpose, but after the Friday prayers, we decided to say hello to Mr. President. It is just coincidence that we met in the mosque and some joined us later and we decided to go to greet him.”
On how best he thinks the crisis between herdsmen and farmers can be tackled, Ganduje stated: “The president met with stakeholders from the affected states and I think a suggestion has been put forward by the Minister of Agriculture concerning the colony and I think eventually that is the answer.”