The national vice chairman (North West) of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Salihu Mohammed Lukman, has resigned.
Lukman, a member of the APC National Working Committee (NWC) in a letter dated July 26 and addressed to the party’s acting national chairman, Senator Abubakar Kyari, said he resigned because the atmosphere in the party is at variance with the vision of its founding fathers.
He stated: “I hereby kindly resign my position as National Vice Chairman, North-West of our great party, All Progressives Congress (APC). My resignation is with immediate effect, which become necessary given my conviction that the atmosphere in the party is completely at variance with the founding vision of forming a progressive party.
“Rather than remaining in the leadership of the party and become a source of distraction for leaders and especially for the young government of President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, it is better to excuse myself and take time off from politics.
“I will however retain my membership of the party in the hope that our leaders, especially President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu will retract from acts that will be unjust and illegal, which is crucial to any claim of being democratic or progressive whether as politicians or as patriotic Nigerians. I wish to convey my sincerely gratitude to our leaders in Kaduna, especially Mallam Nasir Ahmad El-Rufai for finding me worthy of nomination to serve at the highest level of the party’s leadership.
“I do hope all our leaders will appreciate that I am left with no option in the circumstance. I wish the party and all our leaders, especially President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu all the best and will continue to give my modest support towards the success of the party from the background.”
He had said it would be suicidal to replace Senator Abdullahi Adamu, former National Chairman of the ruling party with ex-Governor Abdullahi Ganduje.
APC insiders confirmed to Daily Trust that President Bola Tinubu tipped Ganduje for the office of national chairman following Adamu’s resignation.
The vice chairman who was one of the strong voices that opposed Adamu had said, “Regrettably, however, many of the speculations do not share the commitment to either restore constitutional order in the party or return the party to its founding vision of returning to the path of progressive politics.
“In fact, if anything, some of the speculations, if true, will reduce to nonsense the decision to have a change of leadership, which means that no lessons have been learnt from all the circumstances of the last few years since the emergence of APC as a political party.”r bloc should be allowed to appropriate the process.”
