Reacting to allegations by a former Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) member, Buba Galadima, that Mr. Buhari would be abandoned by the people in 2019, Mr. Shehu said Mr. Galadima's calculation and prediction is utterly confused and misleading.
President Muhammadu Buhari's Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, has dismissed suggestions that the masses will desert the president in 2019 as unfounded and utterly ridiculous. He asserted that ordinary Nigerians are the backbone of Mr. Buhari's mandate and the only reason he ran for the office was to protect them against the rapacious merchants of corruption, who have held Nigeria back for decades.
Reacting to allegations by a former Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) member, Buba Galadima, that Mr. Buhari would be abandoned by the people in 2019, Mr. Shehu said Mr. Galadima's calculation and prediction is utterly confused and misleading.
He said the masses are solidly behind Mr. Buhari because he is not stealing their money and their future, that the president's enormous goodwill remains ever strong because the people are convinced the president is acting in their best interest, despite the temporary unintended consequences of reforms.
"President Muhammadu Buhari is far from isolation. He enjoys a very strategic relationship with ordinary Nigerians. This relationship is as solid a the proverbial rock. If Buba Galadima thinks that because he has no role and no job in this government that means president is isolated he is putting himself up to ridicule," Mr. Shehu said.
According to him, Mr. Galadima cannot speak for the masses as far as their steadfast loyalty to the president is concerned. While acknowledging that Mr. Galadima was entitled to advance his own political agenda, Mr. Garba said Mr. Galadima did not have the right to decide for ordinary voters.
Mr. Shehu recalled that Buba Galadima's disagreement with Mr. Buhari was based on principle. He explained that the president is committed to a level playing field and would not want anyone to link his name to injustice.
The presidential media aide said Mr. Galadima's disagreement with Mr. Buhari started in 2011 when a group within the party orchestrated an organizational mess by which the CPC embarked on the imposition and substitution of candidates for cash payments at the expense of those duly and democratically elected.
He said Muhammadu Buhari was embarrassed by the incidents and complaints about the imposition and substitution of candidates, adding that he, as a democrat, would not suppress the will of the people to please selfish interests. Consequently he dispensed with the service, such as they are, of Buba Galadima and ran and won the 2015 elections without them.
"Let Buba Galadima go to his constituency, stand for election and see what will happen to him," Mr. Shehu concluded.
