How APC can pick consensus candidate without hitch – Presidential aspirant

Ahead of the 2023 general elections, an All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential aspirant Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim has said producing the candidate of the party through consensus will be a good idea and asked President Muhammadu Buhari and the party leadership to midwife the process. The presidential hopeful told Daily Trust that he is comfortable with any […]

Ahead of the 2023 general elections, an All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential aspirant Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim has said producing the candidate of the party through consensus will be a good idea and asked President Muhammadu Buhari and the party leadership to midwife the process.

The presidential hopeful told Daily Trust that he is comfortable with any consensus arrangement inasmuch as it was not forced on the aspirants.

He said, “I don’t have any problem with consensus, my only concern is that it should not be forced, it should not be dictated. Let it be negotiated between the party leadership and it should not just be reduced to party positions.

“Consensus should also mean aggregating viewpoints as to what we need to do to solve the problems of the country.”

The business tycoon, while stressing that the consensus should be negotiated, said the party and the presidency should midwife the process.

“This is what I have been talking about in the last two years. So it is not about who becomes the president, but how do you bring everybody together, so that the division can be bridged. Consensus is a good idea, but don’t force it.

“Let it be negotiated among the aspirants and you midwife it. There is nothing wrong with consensus I am not afraid of it,” he said.

If elected, Olawepo-Hashim said he would come up with a Government of National Unity (GNU) to heal the fracture in the country.

“The country needs healing, it is badly divided, there is massive insecurity in the land; there is a divergent opinion on what should be the structure of the Nigerian state.

“What we need now is a national ambition, not a personal ambition. If I get the ticket of my party and lead the party to victory, one thing I will like to do is to bring everybody on board, with something that looked like a government of national unity.

“It is not going to be a broad-based government within the APC alone, but a government that embraces every talent in other areas even outside political parties, in the diaspora. It is a Nigerian project,” he said.