Former President, Olusegun Obasanjo has called on the National Assembly to expunge from the constitutional provisions that recommend age limit as a condition for eligibility in contesting for the office of the president. The former President made this known on Sunday when he featured on Sunday as the guest speaker at an event tagged "God in my Life" organized by the Torchbearer Society of Archbishop Vining Memorial Church Cathedral, Ikeja, Lagos state.
He maintained that instead of basing eligibility on age, Nigerians should talk about capability and competence.
According to him “Quite frankly, if we put minimum age, why are we not putting maximum age? If they put minimum age and then say that even if you are 90, you can be president, because there is no age limit to being president. To me, there should be no age limit. Gen. Gowon (rtd.) became the Head of State at the age of 33; I became the Head of State at 39… I believe there should be no age limit; let the people decide,” he added.
His statement is coming after the Senate had proposed to reduce the age limit of Presidential aspirants from 40 to 35. The move was triggered by mass protest at the National Assembly Complex by a Coalition of Civil Society Organizations. The protest was tagged "Not Too Young To Run Protest".
