 It's a breakfast and plus CV Africa. Thank you for joining us and staying with us as well. We're heading straight to the next conversation and the possibility of having the APC having a Muslim Muslim ticket, Nika Agulay, a public affairs analyst joins us this morning. Nika Agulay, it's good to have you join us. Well, we also- Thank you very much for having me and good morning to our viewers. All right, thank you so much Nika Agulay. We also have in the studio Adeyemi Saka. Thank you for staying with us as well. Yeah, I'm moving away. So we'll just get straight to it if you can hear us. There are a lot of concerns as the possibility of the APC that has not been confirmed and so of the APC having a Muslim Muslim ticket. Now you have on the other hand, the Christian Association of Niger and the Catholic Society of Nigeria wanting political parties against, I mean, having a Muslim Muslim ticket in 2023 presidential elections. Now what would happen if, you know, political parties decided to this line, Muslim Muslim tickets or maybe Christian Christian tickets? What will be the implication? Thank you very much for that question. I think this discussion is taking national prominence because the two major parties have a Nodena and a Saldana and both Muslims on their presidential tickets. This is what is causing this topic to gain national prominence. And the bottom line here is that people feel that with Atiku Abu Bakar, being the PDP presidential candidate, a Nodena and a Muslim, and Bola Ahamed Tinubu, a Saldana and a Muslim, the APC is disadvantaged. I am not saying so, that's what people feel, that the APC is disadvantaged if they field a Noden Christian. To their thinking, they believe that the Nodenas will not vote for that Noden Christian. They will rather vote for Atiku Abu Bakar, who is a Noden Muslim. And this is the reason why it looks like the APC are being made to consider a Noden Muslim to checkmate or balance the voting dynamics of the Nod. But the people who are making these postulations are wrong on various counts. Firstly, they assume that the whole of Noden Nigeria are Muslims. But that is not the case. Noden Nigeria is split between Muslims and Christians almost on a 50-50% basis. I mean, at the risk of contradiction, if I look at states like Benwe, Kogi, you know, Plato that are also classified as one of the 19 Noden states that are almost 100% Christian. I can say, like I said at the risk of contradiction, that there are more Christians in the Nod, even the Muslims. So those who are making these postulations either are ignorant of the population statistics of the Nod, or they are just trying to be mischievous. Because let me say one thing up front. Like I did say on this program some time back, a Muslim-Muslim ticket had worked in Nigeria before. In President Buhari's time as a military head of states, he was from, I mean, he is from a Katrina state, a Muslim, and he beat Tunde Jiyabon from Qwara, which is also not, and also a Muslim, as his vice. So during that time, we had the two leaders of Nigeria were both Muslims and Nodenas, nothing happened. Fast forward to 1993, we also had a Muslim-Muslim ticket between Abyola and King Ibe, even though there was a North-South representation on that. Again, Nigeria didn't have a problem with that. But in 2023, it's a different dynamic because the past seven years, Nigerians have never been polarized along religious and ethnic divides like in the last seven years. The government of President Buhari has brought this division to the fore, has made Nigerians to become cautious of who is a Muslim, who is a Christian, who is a Nodena, who is a Saldana, who is a Fulani, who is nothing Fulani. So a ticket that has a Muslim-Muslim candidate or need in Nigeria is not going to fly. Let everybody be aware of that. It's not going to fly because at the point where we are now, there is a lot of mistrust within the polity. And there is no way Nigerians are going to back that kind of ticket. I can assure you that if the APC fields a Muslim-Muslim ticket, they are going to lose majority of the votes in the South and they are going to lose a significant number of votes in the North. Like I am from Benwell State. I am classified as a Nodena. I will never put my vote for such a ticket. And I know millions of people will not put their vote for such a ticket. So that is the situation where we are in now. All right. Nikagule, your statistical analysis there stands to be tested. I do not know if you said majority of the populace Nigerians in the Northern Nigerian Christians. I don't know how that can be true when, as according to the World Bank, as recently as 2018, Nigeria was 53.5% Christian, a Muslim rather, and 45.9% Christian. That is 53.5% Muslim and 45.9% Christian. I mean, even if you come to Lagos State, you look at the indigenous of Lagos State. It could be said that it is a slight majority in favor of Muslims. So are we sure that we have more Christians in Northern Nigeria than Muslims? That is doubt. That is something we need to check, by what the World Bank is saying on the balance in the entire country. But are you sure? You need to look at the demographics of the Northern States. There are states in the North, even Boronu, that has a significant amount of Christians, number of Christians. When it says significant, what is the percentage? What's the percentage? We know when it's a significant. Is it 50, 50, 60, 40, 30, 70? What's the percentage? So the percentage of Christians in what is classified as the core Muslim states will be close to 30, 40%. But then when you not come to some states in the North, or which are classified as North, like Adamawa, like Karaba, like Benway, Benway is almost 100% Christians, like Kogi, you know. Then of course, you look at states like Nigeria, you look at all of these states, there are a significant amount of Christians at the 40, 50% basis. So even if you have more Muslims in the North, that percentage is not dominant. It's not going to be anything like 60 to 40 or 70 to 30. It's going to be more to something like 55 to 45, if not 50, 50. So what I'm saying is that you only need to win 25% of the votes in every state and then have the overall advantage nationwide to win a presidential election. And in every state of the North, there are more than 24% of the population that are Christians. So this is not the dynamics. But according to the World Bank, according to the World Bank, majority of Christians are found in the Southeast and Southwest and Middle Belt. But you have majority of the Nigerian Muslim population are found in the Northern part of the country. And as Fabak has 2018, we're told that just under half of those in the Northern part of these states, we talk about Middle Belt Christians. But in Northern urban centers, in Northern urban centers, however, we're told about 95% of the population is Muslim. I'm just going to read something, all right? I said it from an online source. Please permit me to go through this. It says the majority of Christians are now found in the Southeast, South-South, Southwest and Middle Belt region. That's most of the Christians. It didn't say the majority of people in Middle Belt as Christians. But majority of Christians in Nigeria are found in the Southeast, South-South, Southwest and Middle Belt region. It is estimated that around half the Nigerian population today are Muslim. It's about 53. something percent, all right? Over 53%. While just under half, just under half, that's about 47. something percent are Christian. Now, in Northern urban centers, however, 95% of the population is Muslim. You're talking about urban centers. So if you're going to, Bono, you're talking about Medugri, if you're going to Camelot State, you're talking about the Camelot Metropolis and adjoining areas, 95% of those in these urban centers we have the most population are Muslims. Nick. Well, I think the World Bank statistics lacks empirical evidence. And we can debate these demographics because the Nigerian government has not even conducted a census for the past how many years, probably getting to 20 years. I think the last census that was conducted in Nigeria was in 2006. I remember that census. I was in my house. I was not even counted. So for 16 years, the Nigerian government does not even have an idea of how many people we are in Nigeria or the demographics in terms of the gender balance or the youth population vis-a-vis the age population and all of that. We don't have that. Neither do we have any statistics organized as statistics about Christians and Muslims. But the statistics that says Nigeria has more Muslims than Christians is very debatable. It's very debatable, it's not something that we are going to crack here. The point we're making here is that if the APC attempts a Muslim-Muslim ticket, they will put themselves in a huge disadvantage position. Why? Because there are so many, so many Christians, not south of Nigeria that will not put their votes for a Muslim-Muslim ticket in the Nigeria of today. In the Nigeria that has been so polarized in the last seven years along religious and ethnic divides. So the advice I will give to the APC is the APC should look for a competent northern Christian as vice presidential candidate. Once they do that, first and foremost, let us assume that the south-west is going to- Nick Agulet, we need to get back to our day, I mean, Sakha who's in the studio here with us this morning. Let's get quickly to it now. I know that you have a lot to react to what he has said, but just before then, he's made reference of the Biola and Kingi Bay ticket which was a Muslim-Muslim ticket. And it feels like that's also been on top of the front-bone and people are asking. So if we had that time in 1993, I mean, it felt like Nigerians, or it is, Nigerians accepted that ticket, embraced it wholeheartedly. What's different now? Why are we- Why if that was the reason they didn't even get into office? You can never say. Why if that was the reason that the election was announced? Maybe they put into constitution the unit of the country. Is it 1983? We had the Shagaya and the Kweme. In, when Obasanjo was there, Obasanjo-e-Kristain, it went for Yadavah. Though we want to observe Bari Diagmo. Maybe that was in why the government was disconnected from the society, reality was on ground. And in that was a dictatorship. There was no position. It wasn't a democracy. And every time we had a democracy, we've tried to balance things along tribal and religious line. And when people say APC's problem is because of antiquity, emergence as PDP, PDP. No. The APC's edict is Kwan Kwan Suu in Kano. But I would like it to. That's the person that's giving them edict. And you know, when my last effort, at some point said, in Jena Arabi, Moussa Kwan Kwan Suu would divide the votes of PDP in the North. I was laughing. I had not announced, is it not going to be put in- I had not announced that we're going to vote for him. No, we're not supposed to vote for APC. But I mean, is it not there for, does it not there for follow, Remy, that if APC's edict in the North, especially in the Northwest is Kwan Kwan Suu, who is a Muslim, should they not get somebody from either North East or Northwest who is also Muslim to eat into his votes? But Kwan Kwan Suu would divide the votes of Muslims. But why don't you go for the votes of Christians that are not protected with you and vote for you? Why are you making me give APC free a spot like this? Tend them to. But what exactly? That's interesting. But we constantly are in this conversation of the fact that religion has never been, I mean, let's not be divided towards, let's not, I mean, we constantly say- Why does religion not have religion? No, we're just saying that let's not be divided. Let's not go towards religious or ethnic differences. I mean, because that's the message we've been preaching. We've been preaching competence. We've been preaching unity. It doesn't really matter. However, wherever anybody comes from, as long as you know, is a person that we can accept wholeheartedly. Why are we different now? Why does it seem like, you know, nobody really is concerned about national unity? It shouldn't really matter. Shouldn't it matter where anybody comes from? No, we should have gone beyond these. And the greatest disservice the political elites due to Nigerians, especially those from Southwest, was to kick against the draft of the 1995 constitution. That draft guaranteed about in a 30 year cycle. Cycle, in a 30 year cycle, the 6th geopolitical zone would have had it shorter than the presidency. And the constitution says after this 30 year cycle, we cannot decide either to jettison the arrangement or move forward. If somebody from Southeast has become the president, if somebody from North Central has become the president, if somebody from North East, North West, everybody will have a say. Anybody will believe and will see themselves as equal stakeholder in this entity called Nigeria. But some people just decided that no, we should not. That's why we're here. It is singly a five-time, then-proposer in the draft. And it says, in case of what happened with president, who led to president Mao, yeah, that happened. If somebody from that region and elected vice president from that region will complete his term, and the thing goes to the next zone. So I think, and we should look at this, we shouldn't lie to ourselves that religion and ethnicity is not playing a key role in our politics. It is. So to resolve this issue, why don't we just put it there in black and white in our constitution? All right, we have to go. Very interesting. I think that Expo you gave is quite... I'm paint. We'll send an invoice to the party. But it's quite a very interesting one. Nick Agulia has been a guest joining us via Zoom. Nick, thank you so much for your time. Thank you very much. Let me leave here with a message to Nigeria's that all these justlies that are happening now, all the Nani guys, this is the politicians time. Nigeria's time is going to come next year, in February, in March, where we are going to make our voices heard. All right. And we can only do that with a voter's card. Thank you. So let everybody get their voter's card ready and back to what happened in 2023. Thank you very much. And of course, our name is Sakahos Grecius. They've given us his time over two topics. Thank you very much for your time. Yeah. Muslim-Muslim tickets was not a fly. This shouldn't be a battle. Why are we talking about... I mean, Nick Agulia is talking about having to battle. She doesn't like... Anyway, that's the size of a package. We'll return to more right here with the breakfast on Plus TV Africa. Don't forget, you can always follow us on social media, Plus TV Africa. And of course, on YouTube at Plus TV Africa and Plus TV Africa, live style from all of us here. That's the journey. My name is Kofi Bartels. And I am messy, but we'll have a fantastic day.