Individual interest as against the overall interest of party members has been fingered as the major cause of the crisis currently rocking the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), BusinessDay has gathered.
Our correspondent learnt that the party is almost being torn apart over supremacy battle in Ogun, Kwara, Osun, Akwa Ibom, Lagos and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
Whereas Governor Dapo Abiodun is slugging it out with his predecessor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun in Ogun; Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq is at loggerheads with Lai Mohammed, minister of Information and Culture, in Kwara State.
It is the same scenario in Osun State where Governor Gboyega Oyetola is struggling with his predecessor and Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola over the control of the party machinery in the state.
In Akwa Ibom State, Godswill Akpabio, minister of Niger Delta, is in attrition war with John Akpanudoedehe, caretaker committee secretary of the APC, while in Lagos State, the role of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as “king maker” is being challenged by some youth groups that believe the narrative has to change in 2023.
The congresses in Lagos, for instance, opened a pandora’s box of agitation for inclusiveness as against “marginalisation of some members” by entrenched interests.
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Several groups within the party in Lagos, such as Lagos4Lagos, the Conscience Forum, the AAMCO, and the Democrats Political, have consistently protested alleged injustice in the party and the continued exclusion of their members in decision making.
“We are not against the party; we have contributed to the progress of the party in Lagos State. The lack of inclusiveness is what we are talking about. The party cannot be doing something and they push some people outside the arrangement,” Moshood Salvador, a chieftain of the party, said.
BusinessDay gathered that the latest concerns being raised by stakeholders was in reaction to the adoption of consensus arrangement at its congresses, by the national caretaker committee of the party.
The acrimony arising from the party’s ward and local government congresses across the country has been blamed on the efforts by entrenched interest in the party to ensure they retain their structures, despite the agitation by other stakeholders that the old order should be done away with.
Raising concern over the development, Aliyu Audu, a member of the Appeal Committee in Adamawa State, said imposition of candidates on members was responsible for the bad blood and the attendant factions.
“The congresses so far have exposed the tendencies where some individuals are bent on imposing their own persons on the people. Idea of consensus should be thrown away to allow for proper election. We want to have leaders elected at the national convention, and that is the only way to have leaders who will respect members and members will also respect them,” Audu said.
Speaking at a press conference in Abuja, Wednesday, October 6,2021, Abubakar Usman Sadiq, convener of a group within the APC kicking against consensus option of selecting leaders, said: “We take courageous step of admitting that the APC has deviated from the ideal political party our founding fathers envisioned during its formation in 2023.”
According to him, ‘Much more than not, the APC has functioned as an association run and operated in accordance with the wishes and aspirations of whatever group that is dominant at any particular period. If it seems like the APC is headed in the wrong direction today, it is because we laid the foundation and nurtured it towards that trajectory many years ago. We cannot continue in this manner.”
Explaining the reason for the internal rumpus in the party, Ibrahim Modibo, a former member, Presidential Campaign Team, APC, said it was normal in every political association, since according to him, “politics is all about interest.”
“A point to state here is that politics is all about interest. Those who have been there for many years want to protect their interest. The young people coming into the party also want to push their own interest. Some politicians have established structures in the party, unlike the upcoming ones, it is therefore, difficult and they cannot achieve control of the party overnight,” Modibo said.
