By Phineas Padio
“The committee set up to reconcile aggrieved members of our party is belated”, Umar Duhu, pioneer National Vice Chairman (North-East) of the All Progressives Congres (APC), has said.
Duhu spoke to Daybreak exclusive, and took a swipe at the Adamas Oshiomhole led National Working Committee (NWC), blaming it for the party’s current crisis. He however said the APC was poised to clinch victory in majority of states in 2019 despite its internal problems.
“Yes the reconciliation committee is belated, no doubt about that. It is actually despicable for someone to buy a nomination form for like N22 million only to be told the party has forwarded a consensus candidate.
“The party in all honesty has not done well in handling the nomination process, as well as the aftermath of the same”, he added.
In Adamawa State for instance, aggrieved Governorship aspirants, boycotted the Umar Tanko Almakura led committee sitting in Yola.
The aspirants, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, former EFCC chairman and Mahmood Halilu Modi, younger brother of Aisha, President Buhari’s wife who contested the party’s Governorship ticket, were conspicuously absent when the APC National peace and reconciliation committee visited the state to reconcile the aggrieved members of the party as arranged by the NWC of the party.
For Usman Ibrahim, spokesman of Ribadu, “the committee was in Yola only to do the biddings of the incumbent Governor. Adding that all cases of grievances presented to the National secretariat, were thrown out”, maintaining that there was no need to set up any committee as it was a support move for Jibrilla Bindo to actualized his second term bid.
He categorically mocked that the National chairman “should forget about Adamawa State come 2019 as the crisis remains unresolved”.
On President Muhammadu Buhar’s disagreement with the party hierarchy on aggrieved members’ right to seek redress in a law court, Duhu affirmed “The president was right”.
“Granted it is in the constitution of our party that members must exhaust internal mechanism of dispute resolution before going to the court of law.
“But make no mistake, the constitution of the country is supreme. Therefore, if provisions of any constitution contravenes the constitution of the federal republic, that provision is voided to the degree of it’s inconsistency”, he averred.
Duhu disagreed that Atiku Abubakar, PDP Presidential Candidate was a threat to President Buhari, insisting that APC will defeat Atiku, “even in Adamawa State”.
He however, admitted that the country was facing tough security challenges, especially in Adamawa State, where kidnapping and assassination has become a daily occurrence.
“We’re all saddened by recent security challenges, especially the murder of a Prominent physician, Dr. Malgwi and his wife. But trust me, we’ll win the war against terrorism very soon”, he added.
In the same vene, Daniel Shaga Ismaila, Governorship candidate of All Blending Party (ABP) in Adamawa State, has lambasted the APC for what he called “breakdown of law and order in the country”.
He lamented the gruesome murder of Dr. Malgwi and wife, and called on the electorate to vote out incompetence in 2019.
