Some stakeholders of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) have rejected the purported endorsement of a former governor of Nasarawa State, Abdullahi Adamu and former Senate President, Ken Nnamani as the party’s national chairman and deputy chairman ahead of the March 26 national convention.
Adamu was said to have been endorsed during a meeting of APC governors with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, recently.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday in Abuja, the APC National Stakeholders led by Audu Aliyu, said they would resist any form of imposition in the party.
Aliyu said the stakeholders will not accept any handover of the party to “people who don’t share our ideals because they are of the PDP stock.”
He said, “The lingering and now widespread speculation as to the plan to bring a former member of the PDP in the person of Senator Abdullahi Adamu as the APC national chairman in the forthcoming convention, where loyal, qualified and competent foundation members of the APC are also in the race is not only an aberration but a violation of the established principle of APC which respects long term fidelity to the party and frowns at every vestige of injustice.
“He failed grossly in reconciling aggrieved members of our party, particularly from all the states he visited. Senator Adamu failed to accord recognition to the critical mass of young people in the party who are even more aggrieved by the people he consulted during the so-called reconciliation process.”
Aliyu further stated that Adamu does not possess “democratic credentials that should be exemplary of a national chairman in a party like the APC.’
He said, “Additionally, he does not possess the democratic credentials that should be exemplary of a national chairman in a party like the APC, considering that he was one of the strong proponents of Obasanjo’s third term agenda.
“If that agenda had succeeded, the beneficiary may be sitting as a lifetime president today, but we wonder if that development would have deepened democracy so much as to have a progressive party like the APC which some interest now want to hand over to Abdullahi Adamu.
“We, therefore, believe that any endorsement of Senator Abdullahi Adamu, either purported or real, as the chairman of our party is a very dangerous gamble, one that signals a return of our much beloved progressive party to the hands of the original PDP members.
“We are also not unaware of plans to also bring another member of the party from the stock of the People’s Democratic Party in the person of former Senate President Ken Nnamani, to serve as the Deputy National Chairman (South) of the APC. While he is known publicly to be a member of the APC there are several instances where his loyalty to the party has been questioned.”
