PDP Govs Tackle APC on Security, Economy

By Chuks Okocha

State governors elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday challenged the All Progressives Congress (APC) Caretaker/ Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee to show evidence of improvement in the security and economy of Nigeria under President Muhammadu Buhari reign in the last six years.

The PDP governors also berated the Secretary of the APC Extra Ordinary Caretaker Committee, Senator John Akpanudoedehe, for describing their comments on the state of the nation as ill-informed and a waste of time.

Akpanudoedehe was quoted as describing the PDP governors meeting as a mere “political jamboree and its outcome a waste of time with no substance.”

He further claimed that Buhari’s government has done a visible job in upgrading the country’s security architecture, governance, electoral reforms, and has addressed the perennial farmers and herders clashes.

But the PDP governors in a statement issued by the Director-General of the Forum, Hon. Cyril Maduabum, asked: “How has the country’s security architecture been improved by President Buhari other than in the imagination of Akpanudodehe? Is he really serious that security has improved under Buhari?

“What concrete measures has APC government taken to curb herders/farmers clashes other than inciting and ridiculous statements regularly dished out from two presidential aides on behalf of the so called presidency?”

They stated that it is most disheartening that an officer of “an illegal, unelected and unlawful APC contraption is living in a fancy world.”

According to the PDP governors, “If one may ask, when did President Buhari do electoral reforms in the last six years other than vetoing two bills sent to him by the eighth National Assembly on electoral reforms?

“Is it not a hallmark of how low our politics has sunken for an unelected party officer to rubbish the efforts of patriots who are finding lasting solutions to the security and economic challenges facing the country?

“Is he not aware that issues of restructuring, devolution of powers, state policing proposals and ranching have been endorsed by the Nigerian Governors Forum (NDF) with 21 APC governors, Northern Governors Forum with 13 APC governors; Southern Governors Forum, Arewa Consultative Forum and even the El Rufai Committee?”

The PDP governors said perhaps the Caretaker Committee is not elected and consequently, devoid of any democratic mandate as required by the Nigerian Constitution, so “they seem to be insensitive to the feeling and suffering of Nigerians under APC misrule, especially the insecurity and economic challenges facing the country.”

The opposition governors said their communique had called on the president to summon the Nigeria Police Council which is constitutionally mandated to organise and administer the Nigeria Police Force; a statutory organ of state comprising the president as chairman; the 36 state governors, police IG and chairman of the Police Service Commission (PSC) as members; bodies which have practically not been meeting since 2015, to begin to grapple with the immediate problems of policing, pending a constitutionally based restructuring.

They PDP governors then asked: “How can a meeting of 15 state governors that made concrete suggestions on how to improve the almost hopeless Nigerian condition under the APC government be termed a jamboree?

“Can a meeting that called for a speedy passage of the Electoral Act, de-escalation of tension in Nigeria, the equipping, welfare, training, financing, and stoppage of personal attacks on the Nigerian Police Force be termed a jamboree and a waste of time?

“No wonder that after more than a year of usurping the offices of the APC National Executive Committee, the Caretaker Committee is unable to organise a national convention and had described those who sought to hold the APC National Convention as ‘the handwork of political jobbers’ and ‘fifth Columnists.”

They noted that the ‘illegal’ APC Caretaker/ Extraordinarily Convention Planning Committee extended their six month mandate to one year, asking that was it due to the inability of APC to constitute a Board of Trustees (BoT) since 2014 that the national convention be repeated?

“Maybe if the committee faces its unlawful mandate squarely, it would not be making reckless statements,” the governors said.