Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State was noticeably absent when the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar campaigned in the South-West state on Thursday.

At the rally, Atiku, however, commended Makinde in absentia, for providing an enabling environment for the campaign. The former Vice President also said his administration will tackle the security challenges in Nigeria if elected President.

He stated this during his campaign at the Mapo Hall in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital where he lamented that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has failed to keep to every commitment it made to Nigerians prior to 2015.

The campaign was attended by prominent politicians in the state except for the Oyo governor who is a member of the G5, a group of aggrieved governors within the PDP.

The G5 include Makinde as well as Governors Samuel Ortom (Benue), Nyesom Wike (Rivers), Okezie Ikpeazu (Abia) and Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu).

For months, the G5 has been at loggerheads with Atiku and Benue-born Iyorchia Ayu over the chairmanship of the latter. The five dissatisfied governors want Ayu to step down for a southerner as a precondition to support Atiku’s decade-long ambition in the February 25 presidential election. But Ayu has insisted that he would only resign after his four-year constitutional term.