A long time political associate of President Muhammadu Buhari and one of his 2015 coordinators, Alhaji Shariff Usman Babna Lungu after taking a critical look at the emergence of former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar has predicted that 2019 presidential polls will be one of the toughest in the history of presidential elections in Nigeria.
He however expressed confidence that the incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari will win at the end of the day.
“The coming presidential election is definitely going to be hard to predict.
This is the first time former Vice President Abubakar has emerged through free and fair Presidential primaries which he won after investing billions of Naira as reported by the media.
He has never denied and at the age of 72, Atiku will see the 2019 presidential election as a do or die affair because it will be his last opportunity, going by his age.
“He will put in all his resources into the contest.
He is well known all over the country because he has been contesting before.
He also served in Custom Service in which he was posted to several parts of the country.
It is also on record that he has an Igbo wife, Yoruba wife, and other wives from prominent families in the north.
He will also use his business and political associates over the years to help him reach out to the electorate all over the country.
“But President Buhari, according to statistics he is still very popular among majority of Nigerians.
Those against him all along are the elites who are in complete minority.
In 2015, God has proved to them that his integrity and record of service can always be a tool that he can use to sell himself politically.
These are what will still work for Buhari in 2019.
Even if Atiku deploys all his resources which he has in abundance, the ordinary man who still wants his future to be secured will elect Buhari without second thought.
“This is a man that rose to be a General in the Army, he was former G.O.C, former military governor of old North East and he later served as minister for petroleum resources under Obasanjo.
He was a member of the Supreme Military Council, and he later emerged as Nigerian Head of State in December, 1983 before he was toppled two years later.
“Under Abacha, Buhari served as executive Chairman of the defunct PTF.
Yet, he has no foreign account, no house outside Nigeria, except two small houses in Daura and Kaduna.
If this man is not a saint, then he is one personality that one can always vouch for,” he stated.
