APC May Lose Forthcoming Election If Oshiomhole Remains National Chairman

Salihu Lukman, director-general of Progressives Governors Forum, has asked APC’s national executive committee (NEC) to replace Adams Oshiomhole as the national chairman.

Lukman said this in a statement on Friday, saying that the party governorship tickets in the forthcoming elections in Edo, Ondo and Anambra states may be lost, if Oshiomhole remains national chairman.

“First, pending the settlement of all the cases around Oshiomhole’s membership, we need to invoke provisions of Article 17 (vi) which provide that in the event of a vacancy, ‘the relevant party organ shall appoint another person to act in his place pending ratification by the National Convention or Congress,” he said.

“The relevant party organ, in this case, may have to be the NEC. Combinations of majority of the remaining members of the NWC in consultation with President Buhari, Governors, other party leaders who are leading members of the National Caucus can resolve all these issues and convene the NEC to appoint an Acting National Chairman.

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He said the party is in a mess because of the way the Oshiomhole-led NWC members constituted “themselves into an unaccountable assembly with a thuggish temperament, which seeks to browbeat every member of the party especially aspiring candidates into submission”.

“Whether we want to accept it or not, we today found ourselves with the embarrassing situation whereby almost all the structures of the party have been frozen at all levels,” he said.

He said: “It is important to ask the question, assuming in all of these, Oshiomhole remained as the National Chairman and proceed to organise primary elections for Edo, Ondo, and Anambra, how advantageous will that be to APC?

“Let us also assume for the purpose of analysis that undisputed candidates emerge from the primaries in which no one within the party is contesting the results.

“Whether those undisputed candidates include Governors Godwin Obaseki of Edo State and Rotimi Akeredolu, SAN of Ondo State is immaterial. The Zamfara and Bayelsa judicial cloud would appear to have already gathered with any opposition party led by PDP just positioned to harvest what will come with such clouds.

“Given such reality, it will be foolhardy for any upright thinking politician to aspire to contest on the platform of the party with Oshiomhole as the National Chairman. The only possible remedy will be if Comrade Oshiomhole is able to humble himself and go back to the root cause of the problem and resolve it.”

He asked Oshiomhole to “humble himself and go back to his roots and resolve all the causes of the problem”.