14th April, 2022
Bala Mohammed, Bauchi State Governor and a presidential hopeful, has challenged the anti-graft agencies to bring forward any corruption charges they might have against him for the period he served, either as senator or minister.
Mohammed threw the challenge at the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt and Practices Commission (ICPPC) and others on Wednesday while speaking with members of the national working committee of the Peoples Democratic Party on his intention to contest for president in 2023 on the platform.
Bala said he was coming into the presidential race with a clean bill of health.
Bala said, “I am offering myself to run for this office, out of the need to serve because I have served in various level as a media man as a civil servant as a senator, a legislator now as a governor.
“I believe I am one of the best. But I am not found to be one of the best. I am ready to work with anybody that you bring out. That should be understood. I will not call anybody names, I will not underestimate or undermine anybody.
“I will not demean and diminish anybody. Every Nigerian is important. The agenda issues are germane. The youth issues are germane. We cannot ignore the aspirations of the young Nigerians, who may be better positioned to turn around this country.
“At the same time, we cannot discard our old ones. We need experience. We must have a mid-cost approach to everything. The country needs rescue. Everything has failed in all ramifications.
“To do it, we must strategize. We have a strategists in you. An accomplished technocrat. An academician, who has done it before you form this party. God has a way of coming back to the people, who pray. We prayed and we came back. I’m not flattering.
“I am not going to be a northern president or a Muslim-Fulani president or a minority president. I am going to be a Nigerian president, who understands the nuances, the norms and the feelings of Nigerians because I have touched them.”
In his response, the National Chairman of PDP, Iyorchia Ayu, said the party has no preferred presidential candidate.
Ayu added that PDP was well-equipped with qualified aspirants capable to run the affairs of the country successfully.
He said: “Any of our 17 aspirants will do 1000 times better than what APC has subjected Nigerians to in the last few years. We are happy Nigerians will vote for PDP massively. We are very close to the endpoint of rescuing this county and it is my prayer that by next year, we will be at eagle square taking over power to redeem this country.
“If it is you, we know that you are eminently qualified. We don’t have a preferred candidate. If we have our way, we would do term sharing for all the aspirants, because you are all eminently qualified.
“We don’t want to dwell on our past, that of what we did. We want to tell Nigerians that we know what you are going through, we know your problems. And PDP will move to tackle those problems. We don’t want to talk about what we did in 16 years.”