The fallout of the leadership tussle plaguing the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) continues to reverberate across the polity as the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has reacted to the situation.
This was contained in a statement issued on Tuesday by the PDP National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, titled ‘Leadership crisis: APC is defunct, not eligible to contest elections – PDP’.
Ologungba also warned political aspirants under the APC from contesting under the ‘illegal CECPC’ who can “only produce invalid candidates just like in the case of Zamfara and Rivers States in the 2019 general elections where the APC had invalid candidates due to defective primaries.”
Our Party, therefore, urges aspirants intending to contest in the 2023 general elections under the APC as well as their supporters to read the handwriting on the wall and not waste their resources, time and energy in the APC.”
The main opposition, which described the APC as legally defunct, argued that the unilateral dismissal and replacement of Yobe State Governor, Mai Mala Buni, with his Niger State counterpart, Abubakar Bello, by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), as Chairman of the CECPC confirms that the CECPC is an illegal creation lacking statutory powers, authority and legitimacy of party leadership.
“With the absence of a National Working Committee, National Executive Committee, a Board of Trustees or legitimate structures in the States, the APC is plagued by confusion and fierce infighting by its various warlords with two National Chairmen, multiple factions in the states and a national secretariat now taken over by security agencies.
Moreover, by virtue of Section 183 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) which bars a sitting governor from holding ‘any other executive office in any capacity whatsoever’ while serving as a State Governor, the APC’s CECPC whether headed by Governor Buni or Governor Bello remains constitutionally invalid.”
On Monday, the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) reportedly replaced the chairman of its Caretaker Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee (CECPC) Mai Mala Buni
This is as the governor of Niger State, Sani Bello met with the leadership of the party at its Abuja secretariat and went on to swear in 36 New states chairmen of the party.
However, Buni described it as fake news, reports that President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered his removal as the party’s helmsman.
