Tunde Daramola the Lagos State chairman of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) has said the party was strategising and had begun grassroots mobilisation across the country ahead of the 2023 general elections.
Despite placing third behind the two major political parties in Nigeria, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the final results of the 2019 general elections, the ADC has been plagued by internal crisis in recent years due to the suspension of some states executives by the Ralph Okey led national leadership.
Some of them had challenged their suspension in Court and won.
Speaking in an interview with BusinessDay, over the weekend, Daramola said though he and his executives in Lagos had been reinstated, the party had put behind the recent troubled years and was focused on surpassing its achievement in the 2019 general elections.
He said the dissolution of the Lagos executives was the beginning of a setback for ADC generally, adding that the little effort that the alliance in 2019 did facilitated people coming into the party and winning elections in Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Taraba, Adamawa States.
“We reorganised the ADC in Lagos State in 2018, at that time the coalition of Nigeria movement (CNM), of which I was the Lagos State coordinator, merged into ADC because the CNM could not register a political party because of time.
“We breed life into the party. We brought a corner political party to a winning party in Nigeria placing third in the 2019 general elections. Though we had issues recently, I can tell you that we are focused on the task ahead which is to surpass our achievement in 2019, “Daramola said.
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He said the difference between the ADC and other parties in Nigeria was because it was won by the people who are also involved in its day-to-day running.
According to him, “The people are stakeholders and owners of the party, because the idea of ADC was for members to contribute to the running of the party. A situation where you are contributing N500 to run the party, gives you a sense of ownership. So, it is a grassroots party where you are the owner and you are involved in the running.
“When you build a strong party you should be able to attract strong candidates. We have to restructure and build from the grassroots and I know we would see how best to do that.
“I know the national leadership must have learned their lesson because part of the problems last time was the national trying to micro-manage the states chapters”.
