Ex-bank MD Barde emerges Gombe PDP gov candidate

A former Managing Director of Sun Trust Bank, Muhammad Barde, has been elected as the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party in Gombe State.

He was elected on Wednesday ahead of the 2023 general election.

Barde scored 160 out of the total votes cast to defeat his closest rival who polled 119 votes.

Announcing the result, the Chief Returning Officer from the National PDP Secretariat, Chief Mike Oghiadomhe, said the process was peacefully conducted.

Ogiadomhe, while declaring the winner of the primary election, said, “Barde polled the highest votes, thereby becoming the governorship candidate of the PDP in Gombe State.”

Barde was the first runner-up in 2018 during the All Progressives Congress primary, where he was defeated by the incumbent Gombe State Governor Muhammadu Yahaya, but defected to the PDP in 2021.

He ascribed his defection in July 2021 to the Peoples Democratic Party to “bad governance”.

He revealed that he defected in February 2021 when he failed to revalidate his membership with the governing party.

Barde said, “I have formally come to pay my respect to our great party, I left APC when the party asked its members to go through a revalidation exercise. Eventually, I took the membership of the PDP on February 2nd 2021.

“I’m not leaving APC for any reason other than bad governance. What we are witnessing is a government of a person, by a person, and for a person, not a government of the people, for the people, and by the people.

“At the appropriate time, we will tell indigenes of Gombe State that self-aggrandising and accumulation of wealth by one individual can not solve our problem and we are prepared to protect our commonwealth.”

However, the 51-year-old Barde, while receiving his Certificate of Return, said the victory was for the people of Gombe State.