‘A leopard can not change its skin’ APC slams Atiku over ‘no vote no contract’ comment

Atiku Abubakar, the PDP’s presidential candidate, came under fire from the All Progressives Congress on Thursday for remarks he made about voting for appointments in Abeokuta.

According to news sources, Atiku remarked on Wednesday during a town hall meeting with PDP stakeholders in Ogun State that party members who want to be appointed or awarded contracts in his government must ensure the party wins in their voting districts.

The former vice president asserted that the PDP’s members must campaign for the party in each of their local voting booths in order for the party to succeed.

He was quoted to have said, “You are all members of the PDP and supporters of the PDP. You want the PDP to return to power; please, I beg of you, make sure you win your polling booths.

“The fact that you are following the governorship candidate or the senatorial candidate or the House of Representatives candidate or the presidential candidate to campaign is not a qualification that you will get an appointment.

“It is not a qualification that you will get a contract, whether at the local government level, state level, or federal level.”

Reacting to Atiku’s comments, the spokesperson of the Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Campaign Council Festus Keyamo (SAN), said Atiku was already promising people contracts in disregarding the Public Procurement Act.

Keyamo, who spoke to The news media said, “A leopard cannot change its skin. He is already promising contracts to political allies, forgetting that there is a law called the Public Procurement Act.”

Meanwhile, the Director of the Transition Monitoring Group, Auwal Rafsanjani, said, “There are legal frameworks guiding the appointment and issuance of contracts in Nigeria. Appointments in the civil service are made based on the federal character, for example, every state must have at least one minister, and the same is true of ambassadors.

“If he is referring to the appointment of aides, it is up to him to ensure that he moves the country forward without being accused of lopsidedness. It is in the best interest of the candidates to ensure that whatever they do is in line with the law.”