2019: Senator Saraki Declares For Presidency Under PDP

Barring last minutes change of plans, Senate President, Bukola Saraki, will today make formal declaration of his intent to vie for the office of the president on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) come 2019, LEADERSHIP exclusively learnt last night.

The declaration will take place at an elaborate event billed for Abuja.

As a part of the last-minute preparation for the declaration, which will be attended by governors, members of the National Assembly and supporters of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Saraki yesterday visited former President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja, where the duo met behind closed-doors.

Multiple sources told LEADERSHIP that Saraki had gone to intimate Jonathan of his aspiration before its formal declaration today after paying similar visits to former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo, Ibrahim Babangida, former head of state Abdulsalami Abubakar, elder statesman Chief Edwin Clark and some PDP governors, among other party stakeholders.

Saraki, a two-term governor of Kwara State, had aspired to become President in 2014 on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) before shelving his ambition for a return to the senatorial seat of Kwara Central in the Senate in 2015.

Details of the event are shrouded in secrecy in order to avoid the type of treatment meted out to another PDP presidential aspirant, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, who declared his bid yesterday in Abuja at a different venue other than the popular Eagle Square, which his campaign team earlier paid for, after last-minute official refusal of use of the public facility by its managers over curious excuses.

Leadership