Ahead of the March 26 National Convention of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) two leading presidential aspirants, BIla Tinibu and Rochas Okorocha have advised that the legacy parties that merged to form the APC must be respected
The National Leader of APC, Tinubu commended President Muhammadu Buhari for his fatherly role in keeping the party together since its formation.
Tinubu noted that himself, Buhari, and some other chieftains of the party had invested time, energy, ideas, and resources forming the APC.
In a statement, he signed titled: President Muhammadu Buhari’s Optimism About APC Commendable,” Tinubu urged members not to allow their efforts to become a waste.
The former Lagos State governor emphasized the need for APC to strengthen its internal democratic processes to remain relevant.
According to Tinubu: “Recently, President Buhari made a characteristically concise and important statement regarding the strength and purpose of our political party, All Progressives Congress.
“He underscored the need for the party to perfect its internal processes so that it keeps faith to the progressive purpose for which it was founded: to bring forth a better society through just and compassionate good governance.
“Many progressive leaders had invested time, energy, ideas and resources in forming the APC with a view to providing a better Nigeria. The president is a founder of this party. I too have lent my humble bit. As founding fathers of this party, we must continue to guard its purpose.”
Speaking in the same vein, senator Okorocha, who paid a solidarity visit to the acting chairman of the APC CECPC, Governor Sani Bello, Wednesday in Abuja, emphasized the need for the APC to fall back to the virtues that brought the legacy parties together to form the APC
“I can see light now at the end of the tunnel. I am reassured than ever that this convention will take place and it will be free and fair given the leadership in place by Mr President. What needs to be done is to give every member of the party a sense of belonging.
“Not forgetting the founding fathers and the parties that came together to form the APC. One is the CPC; the ACN led by Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu; APGA led by Rochas Okorocha and ANPP led by Yari, Shettima, Onu and a host of them and not forgetting the new PDP.
“It will help to restore confidence in the party and to remind them that those who are the founding members and pillars of the party such as APGA, ACN, ANPP and CPC must be carried along in this convention. If you could recall, what gave us success over PDP was that we treated these four parties as a family. It will be wrong to leave someone like Bola Ahmed Tinubu who has committed so much to the development of this party out of the running of the party, the same for myself, CPC, ANPP and the new PDP and the governors as the pillars of the party as we plan for the convention.”
