Olusegun Olanrewaju
The All Progressives Congress (APC) finally held its long-awaited congresses in states over the weekend amid deep-seated acrimony.
Several court cases are subsisting in many states such as Bayelsa, and it is obvious that the party still has a long way to go to close its ranks.
Top ranking party members like the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, kicked against the exercise, even as the party postponed it in some states, such as Zamfara, Kwara and Anambra.
Ahead of the congresses last Saturday, a member of the National Caretaker Committee of the party, Prof. Mamman Tahir, had announced that the congresses would only hold in 33 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
Tahir, a former director-general of the Nigerian Law School, did not give an exact date when the congresses in the excluded states would hold.
The internal crises had rocked the party, resulting in halting the congresses in some states.
Meanwhile, the chairman of the party’s National Caretaker Committee and Yobe State Governor, Mai Buni, aware of the tension surrounding the congresses, had sued for peace.
He also warned against sabotage, saying the congresses in Zamfara, Kwara and Anambra states had to be put in abeyance for a date to be announced later.
Trouble had loomed large in the party ahead of the release of the congress timetable on July 18.
It was clear that the APC national congresses were under threat as the Supreme Court declared Buni’s chairmanship illegal on July 29, just two days to the D-Day.
In Akwa Ibom, a heavy crisis rocked the ward congresses of APC following the alleged insistence of the National Secretary of the party’s Caretaker Committee, Senator John Akpanudoedehe, to have a consensus arrangement.
A group that called itself the APC Elders Forum led by a former military administrator of Rivers and Ogun states, Group Captain Sam Ewang (retd), had called for free and fair elective ward congresses, instead of consensus.
However, the congresses, which were supposed to take place in the 329 wards in the state, did not hold due to the absence of election materials.
Angry youths, who capitalised on the situation, went on the rampage on Saturday, setting ablaze some sections of the state party secretariat on the Ikot Ekpene Road.
In Bayelsa State, the state chapter of APC postponed its ward congress in deference to an injunction by a state high court.
Some aggrieved members of the party loyal to former Minister of State for Agriculture and Mineral Resources, Heineken Lokpobiri, had filed a suit seeking to stop the conduct of the ward congress in the state.
Subsequently, a state high court, presided over by Enekinimi Uzaka, in a judgement on Friday, ordered the stoppage of the congress, pending the determination of the motion of notice before the court.
The court adjourned the matter to August 9 for further hearing on the matter.
In Osun State, though some wards witnessed a peaceful exercise, there were pockets of protests in some others. The aggrieved persons were contesting the mode of the conduct of the congress in their wards.
Meanwhile, trouble erupted in the Lagos State chapter of the party, as some disgruntled elements reportedly tackled the national leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, over the issue of consensus candidacy.
In fact, there were fears of an implosion in the state chapter of the party as a faction led by a former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Princess Aderenle Adeniran Ogunsanya, and the Convener, Lagos4Lagos Movement, Abdul Azzez Adediran, said it had mobilised over 6,000 members to challenge the ‘political hegemony’ of Tinubu.
The faction, which said the leadership of the former governor was ‘unknown to the party’s constitution, rejected an alleged plot by the Governor’s Advisory Council (GAC) to impose consensus leaders on the party in the state.
The GAC led by Tajudeen Olusi was later to ditch the consensus candidate option for the election of its ward executives.
One of the factional leaders, Abdul-Azeez Adeniran, insisted that elections must be conducted to elect the state party executives.
“I have gone through APC constitution and the only highest decision making organ I found there is NEC and not any GAC…since the body is not known to the party, we can’t take directives from them,” Adeniran was quoted to have declared.
Adeniran also accused the Lagos State Government of hijacking nomination forms sent from the party’s headquarters in Abuja.
In a related development, Keyamo had called for the suspension of the party’s congress, in view of the judgement of the Supreme Court, in an election appeal filed by Peoples’ Democratic Party’s governorship candidate for the Ondo election, Eyitayo Jegede, against Governor Rotimi Akeredolu.
Keyamo warned that the continuous stay of the Buni-led committee could spell doom for the party going forward since the highest court in the land had ruled that no elected executive could hold another office simultaneously.
As the battle of wits goes on in the wake of the crisis in the ruling party, it is obvious that there are still many rivers to cross before things can move forward.
