Afegbua accuses the PDP of orchestrating the CAN-Tinubu squabble.

By Ibekimi Oriamaja

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has been encouraged by Senator Kashim Shettima’s selection as the All Progressives Congress’s vice presidential candidate in recent days, according to Prince Kassim Afegbua, a former commissioner of information in Edo State (APC).

Afegbua stated in a statement issued yesterday in Abuja that his findings revealed that the opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) funded CAN in order to incite negative sentiments against Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Shettima’s candidacies, as well as the APC.

He claimed that it began with Babachir Lawal, a former government federation secretary, and spread to other CAN leaders who never thought it was appropriate to hand over the association’s presidency to a core Northern Christian.

Cardinal John Onaiyekan of Kabba, Kogi State, came the closest in the organization’s 46-year history to becoming president. Previous presidents have all been of Southern descent; however, they want a weak Northern candidate to help the PDP win the election.

“I would like to state unequivocally and categorically that CAN works for the Peoples’ Democratic Party,” he said. They are assisted in maintaining a political consciousness that does not meet any true ecclesiastical emanation test. The PDP had formed a committee to maintain these sentiments, knowing that they would weaken the APC and force it to reverse its well-thought-out decision to nominate a Northern Muslim as the party’s vice presidential candidate. They are being funded covertly by PDP elements, and a meeting a few days ago in Asokoro at the home of a media mogul, where it was decided to continue the agitation, was confirmed by a very reliable source.

I will soon name them if they continue to engage in such satanic plots for cheap political points.”