2nd December, 2010
Nigeriaâ€
In an interview in London with Reuters, Atiku said ill-health prevented Yarâ€
“I would say, four wasted years,†Abubakar said.â€WHERE HAS THIS MONEY GONE?â€Â Nigeriaâ€
“With this administration, all of it has vanished and thatâ€
“My approach would be to return to fiscal discipline, accumulation of comfortable foreign reserves and keeping the excess crude (windfall oil savings account) to actually invest in infrastructure and education,†he pledged.
Atiku promised to revive free-market reforms and fiscal discipline in Africaâ€
Abubakar, who was vice-president from 1999 to 2007, is challenging President Goodluck Jonathan for the ruling partyâ€
“I will expand the scope of the reforms to make sure that we have a more friendly environment for foreign direct investment,†Abubakar told Reuters in an interview during a brief visit to London, in answer to a question on the banking sector.
Presenting himself as a champion of pro-market reforms during his time in office, Abubakar said progress had slowed under the outgoing government and he would create new momentum.
He said he wanted swifter liberalisation of the oil industry, a break-up of the dysfunctional power sector into smaller entities that could more easily be privatised, and greater freedom for the Central Bank of Nigeria.
Abubakar tried to run for president in 2007 under the banner of the ruling Peopleâ€
The PDP candidate, Umaru Yarâ€
In the eyes of many northerners, the next president should be one of them so that the north gets its full eight years. Abubakar is from the north, while Jonathan is a southerner.
Abubakar said that he would honour the agreement, meaning that he would stay for only one term before handing over to a southerner in 2015. He also pledged that if Jonathan won the PDP primaries, he would accept the result and drop out of the race.
Asked why the rotation agreement should still hold more than a decade after the 1999 transition from military to civilian rule, Abubakar said it was for the good of the nation.
“We havenâ€
Jonathan, an ethnic Ijaw from the Niger Delta, is the first person from that region to become president in Nigeriaâ€
“The Niger Delta is multi-ethnic and multi-cultural and his (Jonathanâ€