You didn’t make Buhari President – Presidency slams Tinubu over Ogun Speech
The Presidency criticizes Tinubu for claiming credit for Buhari’s victory.
The Presidency declared on Monday in Abuja that no one can or should claim to have single-handedly engineered the emergence of Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) as President in the 2015 general elections.
The Presidency said in a statement signed by Garba Shehu, Senior Special Assistant to the President for Media and Publicity, that the past should not determine the outcome of the next general election, and that what matters now is electing a candidate who will “make our country better than it has ever been.”
‘Comment on a statement made by a leading APC flagbearer candidate,’ the statement reads.
It was gathered that the former Lagos State Governor Bola Tinubu caused a stir last Thursday when he asserted that Buhari would not have won the presidency in 2015 if it hadn’t been for him.
The presidential candidate made the remark while speaking to APC delegates at the Presidential Lodge in Abeokuta, the capital of Ogun State, ahead of the party’s primary elections.
Reacting to this development, the Presidency said “It is perhaps not surprising that on the eve of the All Progressives Congress flagbearer primary there are those running as candidates who wish to associate themselves with the President’s rise to elected office seven years ago.
“There are many people who played parts large and small in his historic election in 2015, making history as the first opposition candidate to defeat a sitting president with power changing hands peacefully at the ballot box.
“There are those who advised the President to run again; those who decided to build a political party – the APC – that could finally be the political vehicle capable of delivering victory where all other opposition parties and alliances before it had failed.
“Those decisions may have been agreed upon by a few. But they were delivered by thousands and voted for by tens of millions. No one can or should claim to have made this possible.”
It stated further although the 2015 victory was crucial, it is not what should decide the next general election.
“What matters is the future: the policy platforms, the ideas, the drive, and the determination to take over the President’s stewardship of our country and build upon his legacy to make our country better than it has ever been.
“The person most demonstrable in those qualities is the one to lead our party and our country forward,” the Presidency added.
