Former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, has dropped his presidential ambition and pledged to support former Lagos state governor, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
The former speaker met with Tinubu in Abuja on Tuesday.
NEWS FLASH! Former Speaker of House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, has withdrawn from the APC presidential race. The former speaker declared support for Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.#APCPresidentialPrimaries #APCConvention #APCPresidentialPrimary pic.twitter.com/Z6Z0Cb4qzP
— OduNews.com (@OduNewsNG) June 7, 2022
Recall that the APC Presidential screening panel headed by Chief John Oyegun announced that 10 aspirants were disqualified from contesting the primary election. Among those disqualified is Dimeji Bankole.
Mr Oyegun disclosed that all the aspirants passed the ‘basic constitution’ requirement, however, the panel had to shortlist some aspirants.
He applauded the youth that participated in the process, stating that the panel was very impressed with their performances.
“And on that basis (Constitution) every single member or aspirant that presented himself qualified because it was basic and simple. But we are in the governing party and we are keen on continuing the process of replacing—at a proper time—our president with another member of the party.
“It is on that basis that we made our final shortlist. I don’t want to read the names which I think would leave to you (Chairman) but we have a shortlist. We brought the number severely down to 13.
“We could have cut it a little shorter but we wanted deliberately the younger elements to surface for them to be seen, for them to be noticed and no noise. We would hand them over to the party and it is for the party to decide whom their candidate will be.”
