Former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar on Tuesday, formally declared his intention to run for president at the 2019 general elections.
He made the declaration in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, a report monitored on Channels Television said.
Abubakar was vice president between 1999 and 2007 on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
In December, he dumped the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and returned to the PDP. Abubakar said he was on a mission to put Nigeria on the path of growth and set if free from the path of “serial failure” foisted on it by the ruling party.
According to him, since APC came to power about three years ago, it had destroyed all the major sectors, especially education, health and infrastructural sectors through inadequate budgetary allocations and releases.
“Since 2015, we have not seen a 100 kilometres road constructed by the APC federal government anywhere in the country. I have never seen Nigeria so divided along religious, ethnic and regional lines, as a result of the mismanagement of the APC.”
He said he chose to make his presidential intention to run for president public in Rivers State because he believes Governor Nyesom Wike was the live wire of the party.
Abubakar was in Rivers State with some of his supporters, including a former National Chairman of the PDP, Okwesilieze Nwodo, a former governor of Ogun State, Gbenga Daniel, a former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Michael Aondoakaa, and a former senator, Abdul Ningi.
Responding, Wike noted that Alhaji Abubakar was one aspirant feared by the APC.
He however said contrary to what the former vice president said, all genuine members of the PDP were its live wire.
