A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Salihu Lukman said it was belittling for leaders of the party that are competent to take final decision on the power shift and emergence of a presidential candidate for 2023 to go outside the structures of the party and forge partnership with the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) leaders on the matter.
Lukman said such intrigues simply mean loss of confidence in the structures of the party and appealed to all APC leaders to develop more confidence to negotiate every matter, including the issue of power shift, within the structures of the party.
The Director-General of the Progressive Governors’ Forum (PGF) in a statement on Sunday maintained that excessive politicisation in the country is influencing decision of some APC leaders to push negotiation for the emergence of the party’s Presidential candidate for 2023 election outside the structures of the APC.
He said: “This is now threatening the unity of leaders of APC. Around the whole question of power shift, some leaders of the APC have gone outside the structures of the party to mobilise support for the party to zone its Presidential candidate for 2023 to the Southern part of the country.
“In a worrisome way, loose partnership is being contracted with a section of leaders from other opposition political parties, notably PDP. It is important that all APC leaders are reminded that the campaign for power shift is about writing or respecting the rules of our party. This should be handled within the structures of the APC.
“The current trend, which appears to create divisions among APC leaders must be halted. Question of unity among APC leaders is a fundamental precondition for being able to continue to win the support of Nigerians, which is what can guarantee any electoral victory.
“In fact, the confidence of PDP and their supporters is only stronger in campaigning against APC and President Buhari-led Federal Government, using false narrative of failure, because unity among the ranks of APC leaders and members is increasingly being broken.”
Lukman called on all APC members to strongly appeal to all party leaders to rebuild confidence and ensure that every issue that should be addressed within the structures of the party are treated so.
He said the APC Caretaker and Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee needs to take up the issue of uniting all party leaders and ensure that relevant structures of the APC are being used to facilitate negotiation on all emerging issues, including the question of power shift.
“At this point, it is also important to appeal to the APC Caretaker Committee to conclude the work being done to amend the constitution of the party. Strengthening processes of disciplinary hearing and enforcement of decisions should be prioritised. Capacity of the party to regulate the conduct of members and leaders should be strengthened.
“Being a party envisioned to bring about change, regulating the conduct of party members and leaders will be an important catalysing factor to change Nigerian politics and produce the new Nigeria of our dream. The quality of any democracy is defined by the strength of political parties,” the PGF boss said.
Lukman also observed that a major gap being exploited by the opposition against the APC and the Federal Government is that official communication both from the APC and the Federal Government are passive and reactive.
He said efforts to engage Nigerians to secure citizens’ ownership of policy initiatives is quite low, hence political opposition in the country is succeeding to take good advantage of this reality to unfairly portray both the APC and President Buhari in bad light.
