* says Lagos APC is at peace
The National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, says there is no governor from the ruling party that is embattled.
He disclosed this on Wednesday’s night after he led the APC National Working Committee (NWC) to a meeting with the APC governors at Imo State Governor’s Lodge in Abuja.
Oshiomhole dismissed the notion that Governor Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State was absent from the meeting because he was embattled.
The APC national chairman said: “There is no APC Governor that is embattled and because we are democratic, the best way to measure democracy is the presence of more than one person showing interest in an office. That does not make any other person embattled.
“But of course the media can create this impression that there is an earthquake in Lagos, there is no earthquake. At every level, I have seen people claiming that in one or two offices, there was no opposition. In every other office, we have more than one candidate expressing interest. Those people who are currently occupying those positions are not by reasons of those new expressions of interests embattled.
“To say that you have never seen Lagos State Governor in our meetings is to the extent that your lens is blurred. My records and minutes of our meetings will show the participation of Lagos State Governor in all the meetings in which he has been invited.
“But like some other Governors, some meetings have coincided with some other activities. There is no Governor including my humble self when I was a Governor that didn’t manage to achieve 100 percent attendance. Even in parliament, there are minimum requirements so I don’t think it is fair to suggest that you have seen somebody here because of anything.
“I think our party in Lagos is at peace, there are conversations going on at the ward level across the 8,500 wards or there about across the country; conversations are going on within the APC family. Conversations are going on in each of the 774 Local Governments across the country. Our party members are negotiating, they are persuading, they are doing compromises, and they are competing, because we are progressing.
“Across the 36 states, our party activity is at its peak and that is how it is even at the centre. So it will be unfair for anyone out of his own prejudice to label anyone as embattled or being pressured. Everyone has been active.”
Earlier, the Chairman of the Progressive Governors Forum (PGF) and Governor of Imo State, Rochas Okorocha, said the 22 APC governors had agreed to work for the party’s victory in 2019.