As the 2019 general election gathers momentum, Senate President Bukola Saraki yesterday suffered an excruciating defeat in an online poll apparently organised to ascertain his acceptability as a choice for the seat of the Nigerian presidency.
Saraki, who had on Thursday declared his intention to run for president under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), was pitched against Nigerian cross dresser, Okuneye Idris Olarenwaju, popularly known as Bobrisky.
In the online poll organised by twitter user, Soul Jah, whose twitter account is @Jeffphilips1, Bobrisky scored 75% to defeat Bukola Saraki who scored 25% in the poll that recorded a total of 6,306 votes.
A quick check at the maths shows that Saraki scored 1,576 of the 6,306 votes, while Bobrisky scored 4,730 votes of the total vote cast, given him a landslide victory.
In another similar poll which seeks to authenticate the claims by Senate President Bukola Saraki that his decision to run for president was born out of the yearnings of Nigerian youths, the Senate President also suffered another loss as most of the participants who took part in the poll indicated that they did not beg Saraki to contest for president.
Speaking while declaring his intention to contest for the number one seat in the country, Saraki had said “It is with all these in mind, and taking account of the challenges that I have outlined, that I have decided to answer the call of teeming youth who have asked me to run for President. I do so with the firm conviction that I have what it takes to secure inclusive growth for Nigeria and Nigerians.”
But majority of the respondents who responded to a question posed by twitter user, Chidi Okereke who tweets @Chydee asking Nigerian youths to indicate by retweet or like whether or not they begged Saraki to run for president said they did not beg him.
As at the time of filing this report, 4018 persons liked the tweet indicating that they did not beg Saraki to contest for president, while only 174 persons retweeted the tweet indicating that they begged Saraki to contest for president.
The result of the poll is coming few days after the Not Too Young To Run campaigners dissociated the movement from the presidential declaration of the Senate President, who had used the occasion of a public dialogue with political parties on youth candidacy and party primaries organised by the movement in Abuja to declare his presidential ambition.
“The movement wishes to express it’s disappointment with Senator Saraki for usurping a platform designed for young aspirants to dialogue with party leadership to advance his political ambition. We strongly condemn this act by the President of the Senate and dissociate ourselves from his political move, a statement from the movement reads in part.
