VIDEO: Why Tinubu chose 12 states to join campaign tour — Alake

Presidential Campaign Spokesperson for the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council (PCC), Dele Alake, has explained why President Bola Ahmed Tinubu selected 12 states for his 2027 election campaign, saying the president would not abandon governance for campaign activities.

Alake made the clarification during an interview with the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), where he defended Tinubu’s decision to visit selected states rather than campaign across every part of the country.

He said the president was mindful of the need to balance campaign activities with his responsibilities as the nation’s leader.

“I would not overwhelm their attention or suppress their attention to other issues of national importance. That’s why the president said categorically at the inauguration of the campaign council a few days ago that we should excuse him, that he’s not going to abandon governance for campaign.

“And the following day, I saw the headlines in some of the newspapers, I mean, those who are quite objective, the interpretation they gave it, that the president will not abandon governance for campaign.

“Of course, there’s also the, you know, negative section of the media that screamed, “Oh, Tinubu will not go everywhere. Oh, Tinubu will not campaign,” and stuff like that. No, because the president has a lot on his plate.

“Honestly, Musba, I sympathise with him most times when I’m with him.”

ALSO READ: ADC to Tinubu: Explain $12.4bn gap in Nigeria’s external accounts

Asked why he sympathised with the president despite Tinubu’s insistence that he should not be pitied, Alake said the demands of the office were enormous.

“He did, but I’m a human being with feelings, and I have proximity to him. I have access, so I see him.”

Explaining further, he said, “Because the weight on his shoulders is enormous, and I admire him a lot.”

Alake attributed Tinubu’s decision to limit his campaign visits to the demands of being a sitting president, contrasting the situation with the 2023 election, when Tinubu was not yet in office.

“Because his resilience, his stamina, he’s unparalleled. He was not a sitting president in 2023. He wasn’t. So he could afford all the time in the world to go to every corner of the nation.

“But when you’re a sitting president with so much work to do, no, you cannot. And what has he done? He has chosen some states, zonal pivotal states to visit.

“And if you were to do a serious empirical verification of those zones and states, you find out that those places he’s chosen to go are actually deciders, election deciders, those states. So there is no issue there at all. And the man has said he should be commended for that.”

Alake argued that Tinubu’s decision to prioritise governance alongside campaigning should not be interpreted as a lack of commitment to the election.

“Now imagine if you were to say, “Oh, he would leave governance for now and face campaign.” The same nabobs of negativism say, “Ah, we said that this man is not interested in Nigeria, in salvaging the country.”

“But the man says, “Now I’m not going to abandon governance for campaign.” Oh, you say he has no capacity. That’s why we call such people the mattering nabobs of negativism.

“There’s nothing, and there are people like that in the world, in any society, you know, we just pigeonhole them.”