Senator Lawal Shuaibu, the Deputy National Chairman (North) of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has asked the party’s National Chairman, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole to toe the path of honour and step aside.
Shuaibu said Oshiomhole had failed to add value or build on what he met on assumption of office.
The APC chieftain in a letter addressed to Oshiomhole dated May 27, said Oshiomhole lacked “the necessary composure, capabilities and the requisite experience to run a political Party.”
In the letter titled ‘APC: It’s fortune and misfortune, time to act!’ Shuaibu who is from Zamfara State which the party lost to the PDP on Friday, faulted the way and manner Oshiomhole handled primary elections in various states through what he called “unilateral decisions.”
Shuaibu and Oshiomhole had for long disagreed on the political development in Zamfara State as he remained a loyalist of outgoing Governor Abdulaziz Yari.
Apart from Shuaibu, Oshiomhole was also not in the good books of outgoing Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State, and the Minister of Communications, Barr. Adebayo Shittu over the conduct of the APC primaries for the last general elections.
While governorship candidates of Okorocha and Amosun lost the APC ticket to other contenders, Shittu was also disqualified from contesting for the governorship ticket “because he does not have NYSC certificate.”
Shuaibu’s advice for Oshiomhole to resign was the first to come from a top party official. They were elected together at the June 6, 2018 National Convention of the APC held in Abuja.
The APC deputy national chairman also picked holes in the decision to hold National Working Committee (NWC) meetings outside party secretariat and accused Oshiomhole of altering final decisions of the NWC when the minutes were taken.
He said the former Minister of Women Affairs, Hajiya Aisha Alhassan and several other aspirants were single-handedly disqualified by Oshiomhole without just cause contrary to the NWC resolution.
“The respect APC was commanding among its members and sympathizers have been completely eroded, while the goodwill has equally evaporated with the type of attitude of threats to members you deploy, including senior members like governors, senators, ministers and other government officials whose functions do not fall within your jurisdiction,” he said.
According to him, “As I know, the relationship between party and government are cooperation and collaboration to ensure government programmes are implemented in line with the party manifesto, but not shouting and giving marching instructions to government officials on television screens or on the pages of newspapers, and more often than not, they call your bluff and make look helplessly unimportant in the scheme of things.
“Please don’t get me wrong, do not think I am saying these about your conduct as chairman because I want to be chairman. I don’t want to be national chairman because I cannot be even if I want to, for as long as President Muhammadu Buhari is in office, having come from the same North West geo-political zone.
“In advanced democracies, people who fail to add value or build over and above what they met on assumption of duty show some civilized examples, they honourably bow out.
“In that connection therefore, I want to advise you to take the path of honour, to step aside and allow the party to embark on the onerous task of reconstruction and rehabilitation in those states it was weakened by the effect of manner the last primary election exercises were conducted or even the task of recreating the party where it is on the path of extinction,” he added.
