The All Progressives Congress (APC) has been haunted by series of crises that give it out as mere association of strange bedfellows, Assistant Editor, CHUKWUDI NWEJE, writes.
Sunday, September 25, 2016, opened another chapter in the series of crises that have plagued the All Progressives Congress (APC), the political party controlling the federal government, since it won the 2015 general elections.That day, the impasse in the party took a wider dimension following a letter by former Lagos State governor and chieftain of the party, Bola Tinubu, in which he accused the party’s National Chairman, John Odigie-Oyegun, of anti-democratic tendencies and obstructing the wheel of democracy in Ondo State.
Tinubu had accused Odigie-Oyegun of overruling the decision of the party’s appeal panel that had recommended a fresh governorship primary in the state.
Arising from petitions by aggrieved aspirants, the panel had observed that the delegates’ list used to elect a former Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) president, RotimiAkeredolu, as APC candidate in the November 28, 2016 governorship election in the state was tampered with. It thus recommended a fresh primary to select a flag-bearer for the party. The recommendation was not upheld by APC National Working Committee (NWC). Tinubu blamed Odigie-Oyegun for overruling the recommendation, accusing him of breaching the tenets upon which the party was formed.
In the communique from his media office, the former Lagos governor further alleged that some forces within the party were manipulating the National Chairman, and accused him of “political treachery and malfeasance of the basest order”.
The communiqueread in part: “The APC, a party borne of the quest for democratic good governance, is under critical threat by those who managed to be in the party, but never of it. From the party’s inception, the principles of democratic fairness and justice were to guide APC internal deliberations. Party founders realised that only by intramural fair-dealing could the party remain faithful to the progressive ideals that we presented to the Nigerian electorate as our governing creed. If the party could not justly govern itself, it would find it difficult to establish and maintain just government throughout the nation.
“In essence, the party was the embodiment of a democratic promise made between its members as well as a democratic vow made to the public. Evidently, some errant members believe promises and vows are mere words to be easily spoken and more easily broken. Chairman John Oyegun has breached these good pledges in a most overt and brazen display. In doing so, Oyegun has dealt a heavy blow to the very party he professes to lead. It is an awful parent who suffocates his own child for the sake of a few naira. The party was supposed to buttress APC members elected to government at all levels. Because of Oyegun’s conduct of our affairs, the party is rapidly becoming an albatross to those it was meant to help…”
Tinubu therefore demanded the resignation of Oyegun.
Oyegun fights back
The national chairman, in a riposte, however put a lie to Tinubu’s letter, stressing that it contained “reckless falsehood”. In a release on Friday, October 7, Odigie-Oyegun emphatically denied unilaterally upturning the appeal panel’s recommendation for a repeat primary in Ondo. According to him, the NWC rejected the appeal committee’s recommendation on the grounds that the report was fundamentally and fatally flawed.
He particularly kicked against the allegation of corruption against him by Tinubu.
“This reckless and baseless corruption allegation levelled against me is unfortunate and an insult to my person and my hard-earned reputation which I have strongly maintained. Nobody has the kind of money that can buy my conscience or make me do injury to an innocent man. In all the primaries conducted under my watch as national chairman, I have strived to ensure a free, fair, transparent and credible process. The 2016 Ondo State APC governorship primary election was not an exception,” said he.
He had earlier stated that he could not be removed on the pages of the newspaper. The chairman, who made this assertion in a session with State House correspondents, shortly after a close-door meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari, stated that the procedure for removing a party’s national chairman is spelt out in the constitution and does not happen on the pages of newspapers.
He said it was only a difference of opinion and perception that existed between him and Tinubu.
“There is no rift with Asiwaju; we have difference of opinion, difference of perception and I think that is normal. Yes, I agree that the nature of the statement was a bit harsh.
“The method of getting rid of a national chairman, if that is what I will call it, are spelt out in the constitution; they don’t take place on the pages of newspapers,” he said.
Strange bedfellows
Incidentally, the crisis in the party has exposed its underbelly as an association of strange bedfellows.
Tinubu’s letter spoke of “those who managed to be in the party but never of it…”
Ideally, political parties should be an assembly of like minds, with similar ideology, which they hope to transform into national goals. But going by the ugly developments in APC, it seems that the four political parties that formed APC did not share such bond.
The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) and a faction of All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) all existed as distinct opposition parties and had different ideology before they merged as APC.
Even the breakaway faction of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), under the banner of New PDP (nPDP), which identified with APC before the 2015 general election, also had an ideology different from those of the other four parties.
Their common interest was to dislodge the then ruling PDP from power.
In fact, former Senior Special Adviser to then President Goodluck Jonathan, DoyinOkupe, had mocked the newly-registered party and said that it would break up before the elections would hold in April 2015.
Power blocs
Thus, coming from diverse backgrounds, the APC from the outset was composed of different power blocs.There were the ACN and the CPC blocs, which were the dominant entities in the new party. The CPC bloc took the presidential ticket in the person of then General Muhammadu Buhari who was elected president. His Vice, Professor Yemi Osibanjo, came from the ACN. Osibanjo was a former Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice in Lagos when Tinubu was governor. It was apparently to ensure that it was not left out that the PDP wing ensured that BukolaSaraki emerged the Senate President. That, incidentally, was the shot that signalled the regime of suspicion in the party.
As if that was not enough, the unconventional ‘National Leader’ title, which Tinubu appropriated, has seen other top notches in the party, occasionally, at grave unease.
Who runs the party?
In terms of the day-to-day administration of the party, the NWC is its highest organ.
Other party offices like National Chairman, Deputy National Chairman, National Secretary, Deputy National Secretary, Publicity Secretary and others exist at the national level, but not that of National Leader.
Leader of a political party at the national level, in the case of a ruling party, is the President and in the opposition party, the member of that party that occupies the highest position in government.
Consequently, Tinubu’s title of National Leader had at different timesstirred controversy within the APC. Buhari’s foot soldiers, for instance, insinuate that the title connotes mischief on the part of the former Lagos governor. They interpret it as a deliberate attempt by Tinubu to dwarf the President.
Litany of internal crises
Tinubu’s National Leader title is, however, not the only problem in APC. In fact, aside that, the crisis in the APC has come in quick successions.
Although the party survived the damned prediction by critics and went ahead to win the 2015 general elections, the different tendencies within it still flex their muscles.
The first signs of disorder appeared on June 9, 2015 when the eighth National Assembly was inaugurated. The legislators had defied the party leadership and selected leaders that were not those proposed by APC leadership.
Contrary to Senator Ahmed Lawan and Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, who the party leadership had anointed as Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives,in that order, the legislators elected Senator BukolaSaraki and Hon.YakubuDogara.
As if the June 9 exercise was not enough, the legislators again defied the party in selecting other principal officers of the Assembly.
APC had listed Lawan who failed to clinch the seat of Senate president as Majority Leader, Sola Adeyeye (Chief Whip), George Akume (Deputy Majority Leader) and Abu Ibrahim (Deputy Chief Whip).
The thinking was that this would go a long way in assuaging the feeling of disappointment in their group over the June 9 emergence of Saraki that they did not participate in.
The party’s leadership had also reasoned that the exercise would cement the cracks that had developed among its ranks in NASS.
In going about the directive, the APC had trumpeted supremacy of the party in the conduct of its members and need to ensure discipline to whip the senators into line. Part of its argument was that the standing rule in the chambers prescribed that those to occupy the principal offices should be nominated “by” the party.
However, Saraki went ahead to announce Ali Ndume as Senate Leader, Bala Ibn Na’Allah (Senate Deputy Leader) and Francis Alimikhena(Deputy Chief Whip).Lawan-led camp promptly objected to the list read out by the Senate president.
In the House of Representatives, APC had recommended Gbajabiamila (Majority Leader), Alhassan AdoDoguwa (Deputy House Leader), Mohammed TahirMonguno (Chief Whip) and Pally Iriase (Deputy Chief Whip).
The House descended into full-blown crisis when the presiding officers were to be named.
Members broke into two factions; one supporting the ruling party, which sought to choose the principal officers, and the other backing the Speaker, who insisted on defying the directive. The House subsequently adjourned till July 21 without electing its officers.
When the House finally resumed after series of meetings with President Buhari and the leadership of APC, Dogara announced Gbajabiamila (APC, Lagos) as the Majority Leader of the eighth House, thereby ending weeks of bickering in the House over allocation of offices.
He also announced BubaJibrin (North Central) as the Deputy House Leader, Alhassan Ado Doguwa (North West) as the Chief Whip, and Pally Iriase (South South) as Deputy Chief Whip.
Danger not averted
Even with what seemed relative stability in NASS, it was certain that the contending forces in the party were stuck on their positions. It, thus, did not come as surprise to informed observers that the gladiators are returning to the trenches.
Despite spirited attempts by APC leadership to downplay the current face-off among its chieftains, there are indications that the latest rift has unsettled the party and the Presidency. This is even as concerned party members are working round the clock to manage the situation.
Sokoto State governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, who was Speaker of the House of Representatives in the seventh NASS, has been nominated to find an amicable resolution to the crisis. But that seems a tall order, given that party stalwarts are already taking sides in the matter.
Former Vice President AtikuAbubakar, for example, supported Tinubu’s position that Odigie-Oyegun must resign as the party’s national chairman.
On the other hand, Tinubu, who was rumoured to be gathering loyalists to re-align his political tent, has reiterated his unflinching loyalty to President Buhari and the party.
In a statement by his media office, last week, he declared that he remains a staunch APC stalwart and supporter of the APC government under the leadership of Buhari.
“Tinubu is preoccupied with assisting to find solutions to the present challenges now confronting us as a nation,” the statement read.
