Adams Oshiomhole, national
chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), is battling to retain his
position less than five months into his tenure.
According to THISDAY, 15 of the
21 APC governors have collected signatures for his removal and are planning to
converge on Abuja on Tuesday to finalise the plot to remove him.
The newspaper said the aggrieved
governors, being coordinated by one of them from the south-west, are planning
to force a national executive committee (NEC) meeting that would unseat the
national chairman.
Oshiomhole emerged chairman of
the ruling party at the national convention held in June and has led the APC to
victory in two governorship elections – Osun and Ekiti – and polls at national
and state assemblies.
However, some governors of the
ruling party are not satisfied with his leadership style. His disagreement with
the governors reached its height during the primaries of the 2019 elections.
The national working committee
(NWC) of the party did not do the bidding of governors but while some had their
way in the end, others are still in a last-minute rush to secure the tickets of
the party for their preferred candidates.
In the heat of the crisis during
the primaries, Abdulaziz Yari, governor of Zamfara state, said Oshiomhole was
acting like a mini-god.
Yari said he had told the
president that he and some of his colleagues have lost confidence in
Oshiomhole.
But Oshiomhole, who is an
activist, has vowed not to succumb to intimidation.
Blaming those he referred to as
“conservative elements” for spearheading a plot to pass a vote of no confidence
on him, Oshiomhole said their main grouse was his insistence on party supremacy
and discipline.
He vowed not to surrender the
functions of the party, which are constitutionally circumscribed, to any entity
but promised to always reach out to “divergent tendencies and mediate the
disparate political camps in the interest of party cohesion”.
He spoke in a statement which
Simon Ebegbulem, his chief press secretary, issued on his behalf.
“APC under the national
chairmanship of Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, is in safe hands as the party
marches, sure-footedly, to victory in the 2019 general election. This is the
overarching mission of the national working committee (NWC) of the party under
his leadership,” the statement read.
“To be clear, comrade Oshiomhole
did not become national chairman of the governing party to bring it down a
notch from the pedestal of its 2015 electoral victory let alone to preside over
its liquidation.
“Rather, his single-minded goal,
from the outset of his declaration of interest in the position, was to deploy
his capacity in helping to strengthen and reposition the party as a truly
supreme and disciplined political entity.
“Although, it might appear
fortuitous to some persons that he became national chairman at the threshold of
the 2019 general election; the truth is that there is no accident in predestination.
“From the outset, we never
expected that those who cherished and supported the status quo, which Comrade
Oshiomhole supplanted, would cave in easily under the magnitude of the current
political revival that he spearheads.
“Indeed, while the progressives
are enamored of change, the conservatives find it difficult to embrace it. That
is the current reality in the deliberate effort to rebrand the APC.”
He said since Oshiomhole took
over as chairman, he has not taken decisions unilaterally.
“All decisions, so far taken,
passed through the mills of NWC deliberative sessions and enjoyed unanimous
resolutions. The records are there. History will justify Comrade Oshiomhole and
posterity will vindicate him,” he said.
“Therefore, with eyes firmly fixed
on the general election, especially the re-election of President Muhammadu
Buhari in the scheduled February 16 poll, comrade Oshiomhole assures all
stakeholders in the APC of his respect for them. He assures them of his
readiness to work with them for the good of the party.”
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Get off that yeye tyranny out APC.
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