Senator Haliru Jika, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Police Affairs, has emerged as the New Nigeria People’s Party’s candidate for governor of Bauchi State.
Due to Yusuf Ibrahim’s voluntary withdrawal from the race, Jika, who currently represents Bauchi Central Senatorial District in the Senate, won the election without a challenger.
The NNPP’s election chairman, Yusuf Kofar-Mata, announced that the party’s national headquarters had sent them to Bauchi to oversee the poll, flanked by his secretary, Mark Usman.
Jika was selected as the candidate by all of the delegates.
He said, “Following the receipt of the letter of withdrawal of Yusuf Ibrahim from the race, and since Sen. Haliru Jika is now the only aspirant in the race, I hereby affirm him as the gubernatorial candidate of the NNPP in Bauchi State.
“We have 630 delegates here with us who have also affirmed and adopted Haliru Jika as the gubernatorial candidate.
“I want to appreciate the officials of INEC (Independent National Electoral Commission) for their presence to observe all that we have done here today.”
After being confirmed, Senator Jika, a former speaker of the Bauchi State House of Assembly, thanked the delegates and the NNPP for giving him the honor of flying their flag during the upcoming election.
In a brief interview with journalists, Jika said, “The programme of today is in line with the provisions of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) and the provisions of the electoral act which was recently amended by the National Assembly and subsequently accented to by the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“It is in compliance with the document that we have come here as a party to do the affirmation and the substitution.
“What is about to happen in Bauchi is what we have laid the foundation for today. It is a revolution, a generational change, agitation for youths and women that is is about to take place.
“You will agree that the youths and women are the backbone of any society and we are duty-bound to support them and mobilize them so that we can have good governance in Nigeria and in Bauchi state.”
Speaking on his plans for the youths in Bauchi State, he said, “I have put the entire youths in the state in perspective, and I have seen how governance is being delivered in the state and we will soon come out with our blueprint, a working document that will work for Bauchi state.”
Jika, who abandoned the APC for the NNPP after losing the party’s nomination to a former chief of the air staff named Sadique Abubakar, expressed hope that he would succeed as governor of Bauchi state.
“This will start with security, education, heath, tourism, mining and so on and so forth. Very soon, we will unveil that action plan to the people of Bauchi state.
“I am very positive that I’ll win. I am an engineer, and I calculate every risk before I take it, and this risk is worth taking, and I am taking it,” he stated.
