The President alongside his Vice, Namadi Sambo, PDP governors, ministers and presidential aides arrived the PDP Wadata House secretariat of the party in Abuja, in the afternoon to personally obtain the expression of interest and nomination forms.
National Organising Secretary of the party, Abubakar Mustapha, handed over the forms to the President.
Speaking, President Jonathan thanked all those who donated money for him to purchase the form for believing in the country, the ruling party and him, assuring that he would not let them down.
He also thanked the leadership of the party for giving him the right of first refusal even though he would have still collected the form if that had not been done.
His words, “First, let me thank God for today and thank Nigerians that are here today for this brief ceremony.
“Let me thank the leadership of our great party and all members of our party for believing in me. I thank the leadership of our party and all members of our party for giving me the right of first refusal.
“Giving me the right of first refusal has attracted more people than ordinarily it would have.
“I extend my appreciation to other members of our great party, members of NEC that unanimously endorsed that decision
“Secondly, let me use this unique opportunity to thank PDP Governors’ Forum for providing the N2 million for the procurement of the expression of interest form and N20 million for the procurement of the nomination form.
“Let me also thank members of TAN for providing N2 million for the procurement of the expression of interest form and N20 million for the procurement of the nomination form.
“And let me also thank so many Nigerians that I cannot enumerate here but have been formally announced- youth groups, women groups and even students from the north-west, north -east, north-central, south-west, south-east and south-south. I remain most grateful for their gestures.
“I thank them for believing first in this country, secondly for believing in the PDP because they know this is for PDP form and for believing in me.
“I want to reassure them that I will work with all Nigerians.
“And I always maintain, no matter how strong a President is anywhere in the world, you can’t do anything because the President is one individual.
“For you to succeed, you work with people and if we are succeeding, that means we have a team that is working to transform this country.
“I will work with all Nigerians to make sure we move our country to the next level. I always say that the days of saying Nigeria is a potential great country is over, Nigeria is a great country.
“And we just demonstrated that with the way we handled the Ebola case and the whole world is happy with us.
“Let me once again thank all of you that are here for this brief ceremony and to reassure you that we will not let you down, the President assured.
In his brief remarks earlier, PDP National Chairman, Adamu Mu’azu, had said that the President deserved to return because of many achievements he has recorded, expressing confidence that he would do more if he returns in 2015.
The brief ceremony was attended by all the PDP governors, national leadership of the party, ministers and presidential aides.
