Bauchi defectors playing to the gallery – Gov Abubakar

• Says APC’ll win 2019

By Lawrence Olaoye

Bauchi state governor, Mohammed Abubakar, has said that those two Senators who defected from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to the opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Bauchi state are merely playing to the gallery as they had no cogent reason to do so.
Abubakar, who briefed the State House Correspondents after a meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari behind closed door yesterday, said the victory of the ruling party at the recently conducted Senatorial poll in the state indicated that the APC old win the 2019 general election.
Asked the effect of the defection of the duo of Senators Sulaiman Mohammed Nazif and Isa Misau, to the opposition the Bauchi governor said “I don’t want to boast but you know election is local. Some people want to come to Abuja and play to the gallery, and I am talking about the defectors.
My answer is the congresses in Bauchi state along with other states in the APC and in many states that parallel congresses were conducted, because some members of the party were in opposition to the governors who were strong enough to conduct these parallel congresses. In Bauchi state, there was no single parallel congress that was conducted.
Secondly, the 11th August election took place and the APC won resoundingly. Let me tell you that all of those people who decamped including these two senators rallied round and spent a lot of money in order to defeat the APC in the election but the results like I said is out in the public and we have won resoundingly, so I am sure the result of 2019 elections are not going to be any different.”
On what he came to do at theVilla, Abubakar said “This is the first opportunity I have had since the election of 11th August to brief Mr. President because when the election took place, the President was away on short leave abroad and I just came in today to brief him adequately about what transpired in Bauchi.
The results are out in the public and the APC won resoundingly in the election and I have told him that we have learnt a lot of lessons from the the election. For example, close to 200,000 votes were cancelled.
This is an eye opener for us that we have to work very very hard and train agents very well to be able to safeguard this kind of situation.”
Lawal Gumau of the ruling APC had emerged the winner of the recently conducted Bauchi South by-election in the state.