Nigeria’s Former Minister of Education, Oby Ezekwesili, who is also the Presidential candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria, ACPN, has challenged President Muhammadu Buhari to a 20-hour debate.
Oby Ezekwesili who stated that the debate by proxy should not be accepted by Nigerians, said the challenge was aimed at allowing Buhari defend his achievements. The BBOG convener who said that nothing less than 20 hours of debate was acceptable to a country of approximately 200 million people, stressed that the debate should be split in five sessions of four hours each, or four sessions of five hours each.
Oby Ezekwesili further added that the first debate should be held within a week of when campaign officially starts. Her statement reads;
“It appears that there is a conspiracy of the minority to trivialize the issue of presidential debate in a bid to exempt President Muhammadu Buhari from defending his performance and presenting his plans before the Nigerian people.
“This is unacceptable. The people need to know why they should vote for each of the candidates, and they need to know now.
“Make no mistake, the only people Nigerians want to hear from are their presidential hopefuls. Nigerians vote for presidents, and presidents are the ones who get the job done.
“Vice Presidents will not take Nigeria out of poverty. So this is not the time to shortchange citizens with a Vice Presidential debate. Nigerians are voting for top of the ticket, not VP, and they are aware that this is what matters. Anything less than a presidential debate will be considered gross disrespect for the millions of citizens we hope to lead.”
