Senate President says he's 'considering' running against Buhari in 2019

President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, has revealed that hes considering the possibility of running for the office of president against President Muhammadu Buhari in the 2019 presidential election.

The lawmaker disclosed this in an interview with Bloomberg on Tuesday, August 15, 2018.

"I am consulting and actively considering it. I believe I can make the change," he said.

Only weeks after he dumped the ruling All Progressives' Congress (APC) for the opposition People's Democratic Party (PDP), Saraki said the APC has failed to learn from its victory at the polls in 2015.

"The PDP has learnt its lesson from the loss in 2015, and I think unfortunately the APC did not learn from their victory," he said.

He further disclosed that before he returned to the PDP, after dumping the party in the run up to the 2015 elections, an agreement was signed on a number of issues which focused on improving the country.

He said, "We talked about how to sustain and improve the fight against corruption; the issue of providing more powers to the states; inclusion and having a more nationalistic approach on things we do; to continue to improve the environment that will ensure investments.

"We listed a number of items during the discussions with the PDP, and there is a written agreement to that. We trust that we can hold them to that."

He said the PDP is best-positioned to give Nigerians the right kind of leadership that'll lead the country in the right direction.

"We would ensure that the party is strong on security. The APC too have not done well on the issue of security. We have the opportunity with the right kind of presidential candidate and president to provide the leadership for the party. The party has a good opportunity to lead the country in the right direction," he said.

He added, "The fundamentals of whatever we are going to develop is going to be based on sound democracy, credible elections, freedom of choice of Nigerians. If we don't have that as a foundation, then everything else cannot happen."

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Saraki vs Buhari, APC

Ever since his defection from the APC to the PDP last month, Saraki has been involved in a war of words with the leadership of the party led by national chairman, Adams Oshiomhole, who has relentlessly called for his resignation as the leader of the Senate.

The party and certain presidential aides have accused Saraki of working against the Buhari-led administration with certain decisions made in the legislative arm of government.