APC Convention: Anti-consensus aspirants free to contest, says Bagudu

Aspirants opposed to the consensus arrangement made ahead of the All Progressives Congress (APC) convention are free to contest, according to Governor Atiku Bagudu of Kebbi State.

Bagudu, who is chairman of the Progressives Governors’ Forum, said this while briefing reporters after President Muhammadu Buhari’s meeting with governors.

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The pre-convention meeting was attended by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and 16 governors from Kebbi, Plateau, Kogi, Yobe, Ogun, Kaduna, Ekiti, Ebonyi, Imo, Niger, Jigawa, Kwara, Zamfara, Nasarawa, Osun, and Borno States.

Daily Trust had reported how some key stakeholders had opposed the purported endorsement of Senator Abdullahi Adamu as a consensus national chairmanship candidate by the President.

Bagudu, who spoke on behalf of 15 other governors who attended the meeting, said they briefed President Buhari on steps being taken to ensure that consensus candidates emerged.

“Our party is a democratic party, we will always urge consensus, we’ll urge respect for the decisions of the party because the distribution of political party offices here has been approved by the highest organ of the party, which is the National Caretaker Committee, because they were acting in their capacity as the National Executive Committee of the party.”

“But where people still choose to go against the grain, whatever the party constitution allows them, because we wouldn’t do anything undemocratic”.

The PGF chairman also said the meeting further agreed that everything should be put in place for the party to have a successful convention by supporting all the decisions taken by the Governor Mai Buni-led caretaker committee and those taken in his absence.

He said: “Some of you may recall that last week there was a letter that was widely circulated in the media, addressed to me as the Chairman of the Progressive Governors Forum and copied to a number of others, including the Chairman of the Caretaker Committee, the acting Chairman of the Caretaker Committee and indeed the Secretary to the Government of the Federation.

“That letter led to a series of actions, including meetings between the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Chairman of the National Caretaker Committee, Acting Chairman, Governor Abubakar Bello of Niger State, as he was then, and myself.

“We all restated our commitment to working together to ensure that the convention takes place on March 26, 2022 and then we agreed to support all the decisions that were taken by the Caretaker Committee, both acting as a working committee and acting with the donated powers given to it by the National Executive Committee.

“Indeed, the Chairman of the Caretaker, upon his return, also appreciated what the Caretaker Committee did and the decisions that were taken in his absence.”