Shettima: We’ll retire Atiku to Dubai in 2023 — he’s a political tourist

Kashim Shettima, vice-presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), says his party will retire Atiku Abubakar, standard bearer of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to Dubai in 2023.

The former vice-president spent most his time in Dubai after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared President Muhammadu Buhari winner of the 2019 general election.

Speaking when he hosted the APC National Integrity Movement, a support group, in Abuja on Sunday, Shettima said Atiku is a “political tourist” who is only in the country every election circle.

The former governor of Borno said the PDP candidate does not have any achievements to boast of.

“Atiku Abubakar is like a father to me and I hold him in high esteem. But he is a political tourist who is only in this country’s electoral circle and we are going to retire him back to Dubai to go and relax,” he said.

“In every situation, for people to see your worth, they need to see your output at home. I am from the north-east – he is from the north-east.

“Atiku cannot point to three projects that he brought to the north-east or to Northern Nigeria for the eight years that he served as the vice president. He cannot show us three people that he has mentored.”

Shettima said under Bola Tinubu, presidential candidate of the ruling party, the country would witness cohesion.

“The trajectory of global growth is facing Africa and Nigeria will make or mar that transition. That is why I will rather be a small fish in a big pond than be a big fish in a small pond,” he said.

“I supported Asiwaju out of a moral obligation, out of a moral conviction. What we have seen is his opportunity for national collaboration and national cohesion. When the frontlines that divide us were being manipulated for political ends, Asiwaju refused to swallow the pill.

“Nigerians of the younger generation must know Asiwaju’s history of two decades past when he stood firm as the fulcrum to a despotic PDP government in this country when he was viciously maligned and ostracised and that was when he laid the foundation for modern Lagos state.”