Senator representing Edo North, Adams Oshiomhole, has described former Vice President Atiku Abubakar as Nigeria’s most famous political defector.
The former Edo State governor also suggested that no Nigerian is more fit to author a book on the subject of party defections than the former vice president himself.
Speaking during an appearance on Politics Today, a Channels Television programme aired on Tuesday, Oshiomhole traced Atiku’s repeated political shifts as evidence of a long-standing pattern driven by ambition rather than ideology.
Oshiomhole said, “But let me remind you that those who started defection, the most popular one in the history of Nigeria is His Excellency Atiku Abubakar.
“When, as a sitting vice-president of Nigeria, he decamped from PDP to ACN, which is now part of APC, was he courted by no state at all?
“Was he (Abubakar) courted by ACN, which was then led by Bola Tinubu – Asiwaju Tinubu – a non-state president at the time?”
The former APC national chairman used the opportunity to challenge the view that his party lacks cohesion, pointing instead to Atiku’s record of crossing party lines multiple times.
He asked, “Was Atiku Abubakar coerced by Tinubu to come and join us in ACN?
“Did ACN coerce Atiku Abubakar to leave Obasanjo and PDP to pick our ticket and run as president?”
Atiku, who served as Nigeria’s vice president from 1999 to 2007, joined the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 1998, left for the Action Congress (AC) in 2006 amid a fallout with then-President Olusegun Obasanjo, returned to the PDP in 2009, defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2014, and eventually went back to the PDP in 2017.
Oshiomhole continued his critique by questioning Atiku’s return to the PDP after his defeat at the APC presidential primaries.
He queried, “Did we force him to leave our party and return to PDP to contest against Jonathan?
“When he lost, did we coerce him, without being in government, to come back to APC and run against Buhari?”
In a pointed remark, Oshiomhole concluded: “I think the best person who can write a book on why people decamp should be the former vice-president, Atiku Abubakar.
“It would be nice to ask him, as a sitting vice president, you left your party and you were courted by no state at all.”
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