Stories By Ezeocha Nzeh
The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) may have returned to the path of crisis, barely two months after the new National Working Committee was inaugurated
Some members of the NWC on Tuesday accused the National Chairman, Senator Abdulahi Adamu of running the fairs of the party alone without consulting the entire NWC members
In a statement issued by the National Vice Chairman North, Salihu Moh. Lukman, and his SOUTH West counterpart, Isaac Kekemeke, the NWC members alleged that the former Governor of Nasarawa State has by his actions, rendered other members of the NWC redundant, even as they alleged that he invokes the name of President Muhammadu Buhari to blackmail and get the NWC members approve his authocratic decisions.
While regretting that Adamu has severally called scheduled NWC meetings, the members noted that while they cannot stop the chairman from consulting with stakeholders, he must however subject the outcomes of such parleys to deliberations by the NWC rather than his current dictatorial approach of adopting personal views as position of the NWC.
In the statement Titled, ‘APC and the Need for Vigilance:
Urgent Call for Intervention’, the two NWC members said they were compelled to make this statement following serial postponement of the scheduled National Working Committee NWC meetings, twice within 48 hours.
“We are convinced beyond doubt that this is a deliberate attempt to foist a fait accompli on the NWC on fundamental issues that affect our great party”, the stated, in apparent reference to the screening of presidential aspirants ahead of next week’s presidential convention of the party.”
The statement which followed Lukman’s earlier letter to Sen. Adamu and copied some stakeholders of the party, accused the party chairman of not learning from the mistakes of his predecessors.
“Within just two months in the lifespan of the new leadership of our great party, APC, led by His Excellency, Sen. Abdullahi Adamu, the NWC, organ of the party vested with the power of managing the day-to-day affairs, including implementing decisions of the National Executive Committee (NEC), as provided in Article 13.4 of the APC Constitution, has been rendered redundant.
“The National Chairman takes decisions unilaterally. When it suits him, he invokes the name of our leader, President Muhammadu Buhari to blackmail NWC members into accepting his decisions. Every effort to get the Chairman to respect the authority of the NWC as elected by the March 26, 2022 APC National Convention is proving very difficult, if not impossible. Note that NEC’s donation of its powers was to NWC and not to the National Chairman or any individual”, they stated, adding that they have no option but to make this public appeal to all APC leaders to intervene and “please urgently call our National Chairman, His Excellency, Abdullahi Adamu to order, immediately”.
Continuing, the members noted, “As a party, we have suffered enough judicial embarrassments arising from clearly avoidable leadership breach of our party’s constitution and spelt out rules. As members of the NWC who have the mandate of our members, we hereby serve notice to His Excellency, Abdullahi Adamu, and through him to all APC leaders that henceforth, any decision taken by the National Chairman or any other party functionary, which requires the approval of the NWC as enshrined in the APC constitution, will be considered as illegitimate and an infringement on the jurisdictional scope of the NWC, unless otherwise confirmed as validly approved decisions of the NWC or any other legitimate organ of the party.
“No NWC member is elected at the March 26, 2022 National Convention to warm seats or offices in the National Secretariat. We therefore call on all our colleagues in the NWC to rise to these challenging situations by joining hands with us to save our great party and return it to its founding mission of moving Nigeria forward based on honest, fair, just and selfless commitment to party building. God bless our party!”.
