A former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, has given condition to support any aspirant that would emerge as the sole candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP in the presidential primary ahead of 2019.
Atiku said he would gladly support the candidate if only the party conducts credible, free and fair elections at the primaries
Atiku is one of the 13 president aspirants on the platform of the PDP.
He gave the condition when he paid a visit to the Tor Sankera, Chief Abu King Shuluwa, in his Makurdi residence, on Sunday.
There, the former Vice President also assured that he would easily resolve the Tiv/Fulani crisis if he becomes the President of this country.
Asked if he would support whoever emerges as the party’s flagbearer, Atiku said, “Well, I believe whoever emerges candidate of the party at the end of the day will also enjoy the support of others provided the party conducts credible, free and fair elections at the primaries”.
On how he intends to resove Tiv/Fulani crisis, he added, “It’s very easy because traditionally, over hundreds of years, the Fulani and the Tiv have coexisted peacefully.
“And I believe that what is happening of recent could be attributed to some kind of sponsored misunderstanding between them.
“As we have always done, anytime we have conflict between the Fulani and the Tiv, we have always sat down to resolve those misunderstandings and conflicts.
“And even as Zegemule U Tiv (Tiv title holder), in the past, I have spearheaded resolutions of such conflicts when I was in office as Vice President.
“So, it is normal for even brothers or people in the same family to have misunderstanding but the most important thing is their ability to resolve those misunderstanding or conflict,” Atiku stated.
Speaking, Chief Shuluwa posited that the Tiv people do not have any issue with the Fulani.
He, however, stressed that those herdsmen who were attacking and killing the Tiv people were not the Fulani who are of Nigeria.
“The Fulani that you see fighting the Tiv people are not the Fulani that we know and I have always said this.
“We don’t know where these crop of Fulani have come from. The Fulani who are indigenes of Nigeria can never fight a Tiv man.
“As time goes on, all our differences will be healed up. We will make sure that the Fulani that are non Nigerians don’t come into to this land.
“That one I can assure everybody. But we have nothing against the Fulani generally,” Shuluwa stressed.
