{"id":14741,"date":"2019-01-24T12:21:43","date_gmt":"2019-01-24T12:21:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=14741"},"modified":"2019-01-24T12:21:43","modified_gmt":"2019-01-24T12:21:43","slug":"end-of-the-presidential-road-for-oby-ezekwesili","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=14741","title":{"rendered":"End of the presidential road for Oby Ezekwesili; party backs Buhari"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oby Ezekwesili withdraws from presidential race<\/strong>
\nOby Ezekwesili, the presidential candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN), has withdrawn from the February 16 presidential election, PREMIUM TIMES has learnt.
\nIn a statement released early on Thursday morning, Mrs Ezekwesili said she stepped down from the election to help build a coalition to defeat the All Progressive Congress and the peoples Democratic Party in the election.
\nWhen reached to confirm a statement on her withdrawal from the race to become the number one citizen of the country seen on Twitter, an aide to Ms Ezekwesili, Ozioma Ubabukoh, confirmed that the statement was genuine.
\n\u201cYes, she has withdrawn. It is true. You can run with it,\u201d he said.
\nA close associate of Mrs Ezekwesili, Aisha Yusufu, also confirmed the withdrawal.
\nMeanwhile, the\u00a0Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN)\u00a0has withdrawn its support for its presidential candidate, Oby Ezekwesili.
\nThe party declared its support for President Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
\n\u201cThe Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN) is withdrawing support for her presidentia| aspiration and endorsing the second term bid of President Muhammadu Buhari to take Nigeria to the next level,\u201d the party said in a statement on Thursday.
\nThe ACPN was reacting to a decision Thursday morning\u00a0by Mrs Ezekwesili to withdraw from the presidential election.
\nMrs Ezekwesili announced her decision in a statement released by her campaign organisation.
\nShe said her decision is to help build a coalition to defeat the APC and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). This decision, she said, was taken despite resistance from her party.
\nHowever, the ACPN in a press statement made available to journalists during a press briefing in Abuja on Thursday said her action was taken without consulting the party.
\n\u201cThis she does not seeing fit to inform the party whose mandate she is holding,\u201d the party stated.
\nNegotiating ploy?<\/strong>
\nIn addition, the party accused Mrs Ezekwesili of using it as a platform to negotiate to be Nigeria\u2019s finance minister.
\n\u201cI have been put into confidence by one of her aides named lyinoluwa Aboyeji that she only wanted to use the platform of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN) to negotiate to be Nigeria\u2019s finance minister.\u201d
\nGani Galadima, its national chairman and running mate of Mrs Ezekwesili; Paul Isamade; National Secretary; and other officials signed the party\u2019s statement.
\nThe party also accused Mrs Ezekwesili of opening several accounts in the name of the party and her campaign without the knowledge of the party. It urged her to return all properties and donation received.
\nWhen asked if the party had an idea how much she got, the secretary of the party, Paul Isamade, revealed she admitted to the party about a month ago that she got $5000 and N35 million from local donations.
\nHe also said she opened up to have spent N29 million so far.
\nMrs Ezekwesili had said in her Thursday morning statement that she would provide details of her campaign expenses
\nBy Premium Times\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oby Ezekwesili withdraws from presidential race Oby Ezekwesili, the presidential candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN), has withdrawn from the February 16 presidential election, PREMIUM TIMES has learnt. In a statement released early on Thursday morning, Mrs Ezekwesili said she stepped down from the election to help build a coalition to defeat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":13545,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14741\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}