TheCable

Aminu Masari, governor of Katsina state, says President Muhammadu Buhari will get at least 2.5 million votes from the state in 2019.

Masari said this after meeting with Buhari at the presidential villa in Abuja on Thursday.

Buhari, who hails from the state, secured 1,345,441 votes in Katsina in 2015. The state had 2,827,943 registered voters as of then.

As of August, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said it had registered 329,257 new voters in the state.

Speaking with reporters, the Katsina governor said his people were ready to improve on the record given to Buhari in the last presidential election.

“The people of Katsina are 100 per cent behind President Buhari and they will continue to support him even after the elections of 2019,” he said.

“We expect based on figures coming out of the registered voters to give him nothing less than 70 to 80 percent. We don’t have the figures now because they have completed additional registration, we are not talking about the last exercise that led to the election of 2015 and in 2015 he got almost 1.5 million votes from Katsina state, so we expect by 2019 we will be able to give him additional one million making it not less than 2.5 million votes.“

Reacting to the electoral offences commission bill approved by the federal executive council (FEC), on Wednesday, the governor said it would help sanitise the system.

“If I could remember during the Uwais committee, we were heading some subcommittees of former legislators , former and serving governors and we made presentation and part of our recommendations was that apart from the independence of the electoral body, to establish this tribunal so that at least, this tribunal will help in sanitising the electoral process, the legal system as at today is prolonged and takes time and cases are decided when you have even forgotten about your offence and I think, this will help to sanitise and make the elections more credible,” he said.

On the direct and indirect primary controversy, Masari said, “It is not a hot cake. First of all, let me say from all the states that we have read and heard, Lagos, Kano and Niger are the only states that have opted for direct primaries in a country of 36 states plus FCT. I think it shouldn’t be contentious issue. Infact the constitution of the party is very clear, there is nothing contentious in this. The constitution of the party recognises direct, consensus and indirect primaries, so which ever method is adopted, nobody is breaching the constitution of the party, so what is the big deal about it.”