While speaking during an interview on Channels Television on Sunday, September 2, 2018, Sowunmi said Atiku is the only candidate that can stand up to and defeat incumbent president, Muhammadu Buhari, in the 2019 presidential election.

Sowunmi said Atiku is the only aspirant in the presidential race with well-articulated ideas on how to transform the country and deliver it from its various problems. He noted that the former vice president already has a good track record to show that he deserves the trust of the Nigerian electorate to hand him the reins.

He said, "Atiku is the man that the nation is waiting for. The country has a few issues it has to deal with urgently. One of them is that the country needs to figure out how to solve its unemployment problem. Atiku has a very good plan on that because he has the antecedent.

"This country is too divided. You need to unite it together. You need someone who has gotten the buy-in of all of the sections, at least for trust, before you can say you want to unify it and form a unity government.

"You need someone who understands what it meeans to open up the economy and allow the economy to grow. All of the growth that happened between 1999 to 2003, until all of the crisis with Obasanjo started, was all down to Atiku.

"In actual fact, the reason why the country was still able to last so long with all of the telecoms, the pension reforms and all of those things, were ideas that were birthed on the incubation table of Atiku.

"When you see a presidential candidate that from day one keeps talking about how to do restructuring, tells you his idea of restructuring, how's his position on Brexit, how's his position on a lot of strong issues, puts his position on the table for people to interrogate, you cannot but say that Nigerians are ready."

When asked what step Atiku would take if he doesn't win the ticket of the opposition PDP, Sowunmi said it was impossible and could only lead to a crisis.

"He can't lose the ticket, it is practically impossible. Human beings have to vote and they've taken a position that Atiku is the candidate they're expecting. Anything other than that is crisis," he said.

Atiku to battle long list of aspirants for PDP's ticket

While he's one of the favourites to win the presidential ticket of the PDP, Atiku will have to defeat a lot of influential politicians who have also set their eyes on the prize.

He faces competition in Senate President, Bukola Saraki, Sokoto State governor, Aminu Tambuwal, Gombe State governor, Ibrahim Dankwambo, and former governors, Sule Lamido, Attahiru Bafarawa, Jonah Jang, Ahmed Makarfi, as well as Rabiu Kwankwaso.

To avoid any crisis after the party's primary election, PDP has announced that all presidential aspirants in the party must sign an undertaking which is expected to compel them to accept and back the winner instead of causing an internal rift.