From Cross Udo, Abuja
Cross River State Governor, Ben Ayade, has pledged to support former President Goodluck Jonathan if the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) presents him as the party’s flagbearer for the 2023 election.

Ayade stated this while briefing State House correspondents after he met behind closed doors yesterday with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

The governor, however, announced that he had secured the president’s nod to hold consultations over his own presidential ambition.
He explained that he was at the villa to seek direction from Buhari on how to align in the run up to the 2023 poll, noting that he would do whatever the president directs.

He said, “I am here, because I’ve just finished a meeting with the president. And this meeting turned out to be one of my most enthusiastic meetings ever. Well, let me first acknowledge the depth of knowledge and the depth of the intellect that the president exudes.

“His master hand understanding of the international and global security challenges and dovetailing into the Nigerian situation. And what he has done to be able to stem the continuous incursion of bandits and Boko Haram into Nigeria.

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“This country would have been in a worse situation, but President Muhammadu Buhari, given the fall of Afghanistan, given the massive movement of people who have a feeling that the West African province belongs to them by birth, and therefore Muslims of West African origin, and Christians, in their opinion, are infidels and therefore must be wiped out.

“The President was thoroughly tutored on the subject of global security. And I think it will be child’s play for anybody to misunderstand the enormity of the security challenges of this nation.

“If President Muhammadu Buhari was not the president, perhaps things could have been worse. I say this with all confidence, because I do recall when we use to have bombings even right here in the city of Abuja. The flags that used to adorn most of our northern states as Boko Haram enclaves have all been brought down.

“This does not stop occasional incidents of attack here and there. Guerrilla war takes 30 to 40 years to end. The Algeria experience is too recent for us to remember.”
He pointed out that he did not tell the president that he wanted to join the presidential race as he observed that it was not decent telling an office holder that one was interested in taking over his office.

He, however, said the president expressed delight that he did not speak of his desire to succeed him in office, but gave him the go ahead to hold consultations on the matter while he (Buhari) watches him.
Asked what he will be doing at the end of his eight-year tenure as governor, he said, “I went to the president to tell him, I am here to join him to support him in the process of producing his successor.

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“And that peradventure, power is to go to the south, peradventure perhaps it is to go to South-South, I’m the only sitting governor from the South-South.
“The president didn’t allow me to finish. And the president says I know you and recounts our relationship. I asked him, can I? Because I’m not here for that unless you say so.”

Further asked to be specific whether he is running, Ayade said, “My answer is that I am running because the president has said you go while I watch. As reporters, I want you to report me intellectually. I want you to understand that, truly, outside all the cheap talks, the truth is that my approach to the president is different.

“I will support the president’s candidate. Even though I am on standby if I’m available. If you’re the choice, I will support the president’s candidate. And the president says you are not outside of my view. Go. I give you a blessing, go and consult, ensure that you engage with key people while I watch. I think it’s a dedication that I have the right to go and try, to go and declare so I will.”

Asked about his chances against ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, should he join the race, Ayade stated: “I have great respect for Jonathan. So, I have no challenges whatsoever.

“I believe that the party leadership will decide the appropriate candidate that will take our party to victory, and so if you heard me well, I am just part of the family, absolutely loyal to the president, seeking to run for president, and I’m running.

“But at any point in time that the political leadership of my party, the APC feels that Jonathan is the appropriate candidate that will actually take us to victory, I will turn my support for him.

I am never, ever going to fight the establishment, the institution, the aristocracy, the spiritual vortex of which God has placed a leader of a country.

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“I will never question the powers of the leader of a country. I have never played the politics of antagonism or fight.

“If you know how I became governor, I became governor by offering to support whoever the governor wanted, and by stroke of luck, I became the candidate.

“By the same token, I am only here to support the president’s candidate, and by a stroke of luck, he said, you too go there and join the race and let me see.”

Ayade went on to spell out his programme of action for the country if he becomes the president next year, stressing that his administration would concentrate on three key areas, security, employment, and economy.