APC Chairmanship: Stakeholders Insist on Open Contest by Aspirants

Juliet Akoje in Abuja

Ahead of the national convention of the All Progressives Congress (APC), concerned APC North-West Stakeholders’ forum has insisted that those who are aspiring for the party chairmanship should be allowed to test their popularity.

The National Convener of the group, Alhaji Sani Abubakar, in a statement argued that the call was necessitated by purported move to impose Senator Abdullahi Adamu as the national chairman of the party.

The group expressed concern that some of the party’s governors from the North-west geopolitical zone were already dropping the name of President Muhammadu Buhari purely to promote the candidacy of Adamu.

The group cautioned some members of the Progressive Governors’ Forum (PGF) to thread with caution so as not to destroy the APC, saying there would be consequences for any act that causes problems for the party.

The group noted: “The stakeholders have become aware that members of the PGF from the North-west who championed this errant position are acting out their own greed and personal agenda, which is that each of them is hopeful of emerging the running mate to an eventual APC presidential candidate from the South.

“It is most unfortunate that people who currently (individually) hold the mandate for the wellbeing of millions of people as state governors are unable to subjugate their selfish interest for national interest, party loyalty and the long-term stability of Nigeria’s democracy.

“It is tragic how these individuals overheated the polity simply out of desperation to occupy a position that is not zoned to their areas.

“These persons from the Northwest looking for the position of vice president that, going by our history as a country, it is well known that the best the region could get after 2023 is the national chairmanship position of the party.”

The forum added: “All those pushing for a candidate from the North Central to be made a consensus chairman of the party, which has earlier been zoned to the Northwest, are traitors and seem to only be interested in rubbishing the president’s legacies in office by appending his name as mark of approval to their plans.”

The group added that it would insist on the national convention being elective in the true sense so that delegates can carry out the wishes of party members by electing the party national chairman in accordance with the agreed zoning arrangement.