2023: Atiku will serve one term if elected president, says Dokpesi

Raymond Dokpesi, former chairman of Daar Communications, says Atiku Abubakar, former vice-president, will serve for one term if elected president in 2023. 

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftain spoke on Monday at the party stakeholders’ meeting in Umuahia, the Abia capital.

Dokpesi, who heads Abubakar’s presidential campaign technical committee, said the former vice-president is the “surest” candidate to unseat the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 2023 election.

He said if elected president in 2023, Atiku will serve for a single four-year term, then work towards handing over to someone from the south-east in 2027.

“Atiku is the surest bet. He is the shortest cut to a south-east presidency. The truth is that he will be about 80 years then. We only need him to rescue Nigeria now,” he said.

“We are confronted with heavy challenges as a nation. Once we lay the foundation for restructuring and for pushing Nigeria forward, then he will exit. He is not coming because he is hungry but he has an agenda, and the agenda is Nigeria.

“We are in a grave situation in Nigeria. We need to unite. We need to take power from these impostors that have seized power and run Nigeria aground.

“Our party believes in rotation of the office of president between the north and south for two terms of eight years. That was why former President Olusegun Obasanjo handed over to late Umaru Yar’Adua, but after his death, former President Goodluck Jonathan took over and completed his first term.

“Jonathan also asked for another four years which was given to him, but when he started asking for another term in 2015, the north felt it was against the zoning agreement of the party.

“So, we went into the election with a divided house and we lost. That is why we have reasoned that for us to wrestle power from APC, we need a strong presidential candidate from the north.

“Since it is believed that the north-east and south-east are the two geo-political zones that have not produced a president, we felt that Atiku, coming from the north-east, is a strong candidate for the job.

“We must put forward a strategy and the strategy of winning. We are not soldiers; we cannot carry guns and chase APC away. So, we must calculate and ride on the back of who is that benevolent northerner for these remaining four years; four years I am saying because eight years would be passed by then.”

Dokpesi added that he will put his life on the line to ensure that a president of south-east extraction is elected president after Atiku serves a one-year term.

“If I’m alive till then, I will go naked in a one-man march if south-east is not given the presidency. I will put my life on the line. I will never be silent,” he said.

“It’s a matter of timing. Those clamouring for the southern presidency now are APC governors and they are doing so for selfish reasons. Buhari has never respected the equity provision in our constitution.”