Minister in the Presidency, Mr. Nasir el-Rufai, has said that former dictator, General Ibrahim Babangida will not be allowed to return to power by the government in 2007. “We won‘t let him come back after reviewing the state of the nation before the transfer of power in 1999 from the military to the civilian,” el-Rufai said.

 El-Rufai, at the launching of the Heart of Africa project in Washington, United States told a business forum on Nigeria‘s socio-economic reforms as a model for Africa‘s development, that the Federal Government was determined to stop Babangida.

Empowered Newswire, an independent Nigerian news agency based in the US, quoted the minister as saying on Tuesday that the government would not allow Babangida to emerge as the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party.

According to him, the PDP has created a screening process that will ensure that the next presidential nominee from the party will be a decent and honest, person “whose age would fall between 44 and 55.” Babangida is 65.

“A member of our generation that will emerge as the President and I think I know who it is,” he added.

His comments caused a mild uproar among the audience, prompting him to clarify that neither him nor any other member of the current government reform team would succeed Obasanjo.

According to him, it will be ”absurd” for members of the reform team to run now ”because the political infrastructure is not ready for us.”