Police storm APC secretariat as aggrieved members move against Buni

• Rule of law must be respected – Marafa

• Kano chieftain wants ex-Zamfara lawmaker sanctioned

Heavily armed policemen yesterday took over the national secretariat of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Abuja to foil the protest against the chairman of the caretaker committee of the party, Governor Mai Mala Buni of Yobe State.

The policemen, who arrived at the party’s secretariat in their Toyota Hilux vans, quickly took positions at strategic locations. 

Daily Trust gathered from impeccable sources at the party’s headquarters that the armed policemen took over the premises sequel to information that some protesters were planning to storm the place. 

It was hinted that some party members from the southern part of the country planned to stage a protest against the chairman of the party. 

Secretary of the APC caretaker committee, Sen John Akpanudoedehe, said the policemen were deployed to forestall the breakdown of law and order.  

He told newsmen that the security operatives took over the area because there was a security report in that regard. 

Meanwhile, a chieftain of the party, Senator Kabiru Garba Marafa, has dismissed the threat by the Buni committee to expel him, describing it as an empty threat.

He said the party should revert to the rule of law or face extinction in the nation’s political circle.

Marafa, who represented Zamfara Central Senatorial District in the last assembly, had on Sunday threatened to institute legal action against Buni over the violation of the party’s constitution in the conduct of its affairs.

The caretaker committee had on Monday warned Marafa to submit to party supremacy or be sanctioned.

But reacting to the threat, Marafa said in a statement on Wednesday that he cannot be silenced by the threat of the caretaker committee. 

“The committee is illegal and alien to the constitution of the party, we are building everything on nothing. Rather than the expulsion threat, the committee or the chairman should respond to issues I raised,” he said.

But the deputy chairman of the APC in Kano, Shehu Maigari, described Marafa’s utterances as unguarded.

“The recent unguarded utterance made by Senator Marafa resembles the type of utterances he kept on voicing in the past that led to the fall of the party in Zamfara State. 

“Therefore, one should not be allowed to be twisting the party just like a steering wheel, he should be cautioned, in the event that he fails to play the game according to laid down rules and regulations of the party, he should be summarily dealt with in accordance with Article 21 of the party’s constitution,” he said.

Shehu is of the Abdullahi Abbas-led executive of the APC in Kano State loyal to the state governor, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje.