FORMER Vice President Atiku Abubakar is the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2019 presidential election.
Atiku Abubakar polled 1532 votes to get the ticket, defeating his closest rival the Governor of Sokoto State, Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal, who polled 693 votes at the party’s National Convention held in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, Chairman of PDP Convention Committee, disclosed this on Sunday at the Adokiye Amaesiamaka Sports Complex, Igwurita-Ali, Port Harcourt while announcing the results of the 2018 special national convention of the party.
The results go thus:
Void votes = 68
Ahmed Datti = 05
Jonah jang = 19
David Mark = 35
Bafarawa = 48
Kabiru Turaki = 65
Ahmed M Makarfi = 74
Sule Lamido = 96
Dankwambo = 111
Kwankwaso = 158
Bukola Saraki = 317
Aminu Tambuwal = 693
Atiku Abubakar = 1,532
Total delegates = 3,274
72-year-old Atiku Abubakar, a businessman, who served as the second elected vice-president of Nigeria from 1999 to 2007, on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), with President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Abubakar worked in the Nigeria Customs Service for twenty years, rising to become the Deputy Director before he retired in April 1989 to go into politics.
He ran for the office of governor in the Gongola State (now Adamawa and Taraba States) in 1991, and for the Presidency in 1993, placing third after MKO Abiola and Babagana Kingibe in the Social Democratic Party (SDP) primaries.
In 1998 he was elected Governor of Adamawa State. While still Governor-Elect he was selected by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Presidential candidate Olusegun Obasanjo as his running mate.
The duo went on to win elections in February 1999, and Abubakar was sworn-in as Nigeria’s second democratically elected vice president on 29 May 1999.
Abubakar’s second term as Vice President was marked by a stormy relationship with President Obasanjo.
Abubakar ran for presidency on the platform of the Action Congress, having quit the PDP on account of his issues with President Obasanjo.
Abubakar lost the election, placing third after Umaru Yar’Adua and Muhammadu Buhari of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP).
He joined the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and sought the party’s ticket in 2014 but lost to President Muhammadu Buhari at the primary held in Lagos.
Abubaker defected again in May to PDP where he on Sunday clinched the ticket to tackle incumbent President Buhari in the 2019 presidential election.
Abubakar is a co-founder of Intels, an oil servicing business with extensive operations in Nigeria and abroad and founder of the American University of Nigeria (AUN).
