Reactions trails Atiku’s absence at the candidates

The absence of the presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party(PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and his running mate, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa at the 5th edition of the town hall meeting called ‘The Candidates’ billed to feature the duo on Tuesday has spark reactions especially online.

‘The Candidates’ is a two hours live televised town hall meetings that features the presidential candidates of the six leading political parties on different episode of the meetings. The series which has been running since the 17th of November has featured 4 presidential candidates and their running mates which includes Prince Adewole Adebayo of the Social Democratic Party(SDP) and running mate Alh. Yusuf Buhari, Omoyele Sowore of the African Action Congress(AAC) and running mate, Barr. Haruna Magashi, Sen. Rabiu Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria Peoples Party and running mate, Bishop Isaac Idahosa, Mr. Peter Obi (CON) and running mate, Dr. Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed of the Labour Party(LP).

Nigerians have taken to their social media especially Twitter to express their disappointment following an announcement by the Nigeria Television Authority (NTA), one of the sponsors of the series, few hours to the commencement of the show that the PDP presidential candidate and his running mate will not be attending the meeting.

Read Also: 2023: Daria Media to interview Nigeria presidential candidates

The announcement from NTA reads; “Due to unavoidable conflicts, Alh. Atiku Abubakar and his running mate, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa of the People’s democratic Party will not be participating in The Candidates Presidential Town Hall Series.”

Reacting to the development, popular tweep, @DanielRegha said “Atiku (just like Tinubu) has been shying away from presidential debates, as he did the same thing when Arise TV hosted theirs; He sent Okowa to represent him but had time to watch Arsenal Premier league match and make tweets. He has no justifiable excuse to miss a political debate,”

Another tweep, @Dinokaysman asked why the presidential candidate is shying away from debates.
“Why are they running away from answering questions from Nigerians? Is this how they want to rule or ruin us?” he asked rhetorically.

@apanpa-olasumbo said the former Vice-president did not attend the meeting to avoid the host’s hard question. According to him, “They have backed out. Nothing to tell Nigerians, or Atiku afraid of Kadaria’s questions. He can’t forget how she exposed his profligacy in 2019, when he admitted selling one of our national assets way below cost price, calling it a mistake! He can’t face her again,”