In a surprise move, Nigeria’s president Muhammadu Buhari has announced that he will attend a meeting to be convened tomorrow by Victor Giadom, one of the two men laying claim to the leadership of the All Progressives’ Congress (APC), which controls the presidency and both houses of parliament.
In a series of Tweets, the president’s spokesperson Garba Shehu said that: “The president has received very convincing advice on the position of the law as far as the situation in the party is concerned and has determined that the law is on the side of Victor Giadom as Acting National Chairman. And because he will always act in accordance with the law, the President will be attending the virtual meeting called for tomorrow afternoon.
“We urge the media to stop promoting manufactured controversies and to not give any further room for mischievous interpretations of the law on this matter.
“In addition to the president, the Giadom meeting will hopefully, be attended by our governors and leaders of the National Assembly.”
A former Commissioner of Works in the Southern oil-rich state of Rivers, Mr Giadom is a political disciple of the Minister of Transport Chibuike Amaechi, himself a former two-time governor famed for being a vocal maverick.
There has been a growing rift between the factions within the All Progressives Congress (APC) since a Court of Appeal announced the suspension of the APC’s erstwhile chairman Adams Oshiomhole, a combative ex-unionist and former governor of Edo, who has presided over a tumultuous state of affairs at the party.
Mr Oshiomhole, perceived by critics to be a pugilistic politician who shuns consensus-building, has been locked in a fierce battle with a group of governors, who oppose his style and are perceived to be hell bent on neutralizing him.
Mr Oshiomhole’s opponents say that he has repeatedly flouted the party’s guidelines by refusing to convene meetings of the party’s National Executive Committee, paying bloated salaries to members of the National Working Committee, and appointing unelected officers into the party’s National Working Committee. Party insiders say that the president’s surprising show of support for Mr Giadom means that Oshiomhole is almost certainly going to be expelled from the party’s National Working Committee.
After Mr Oshiomhole’s shock ouster by a Federal Appeal court a few weeks ago, the party’s National Working Committee NWC endorsed the appointment of a former Oyo governor Mr Abiola Ajimobi to act in his stead. This was resisted by Mr Giadom who relied on an earlier court judgement to declare himself the party’s acting National Chairman.
Mr Ajimobi is gravely ill and while most observers saw the NWC’s coronation of Ajimobi as an attempt by Oshiomhole and his allies to run the party by proxy, Giadom’s aggressive push to take over the party jolted the party’s hierarchy who tried, albeit unsuccessfully to expel him from the party through court judgements in his home state of Rivers.
The impasse effectively led to a schism, and a proxy battle between the chairman of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum Kayode Fayemi, transport minister Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, aviation minister Hadi Sirika, Kaduna’s governor Nasir el-Rufai and the Tinubu/Oshiomhole faction of the party. A scrum of governors, upset at the manner in which one of their colleagues the governor of Edo state Godwin Obaseki was humiliated out of the party by his predecessor Mr Oshiomhole, his estranged predecessor, also joined the anti-Oshiomhole camp.
Since Ajimobi was critically ill, after reportedly contracting the COVID-19 coronavirus the party’s executive committee settled on Hilliard Eta, a little known Cross River politician, who is believed to owe fealty to Mr Oshiomhole. However, Mr Giadom refused to budge, using the courts and the law enforcement authorities to continue in his disputed role as the APC’s acting National Chairman. And while acknowledging that this was a temporary position, Mr Giadom has repeatedly said that he will only accept decisions taken by the party’s larger decision-making organ, the National Executive Committee. Only one member of the party’s NWC, Salisu Mohammed, the APC’s National Vice-Chairman (North-East), himself an avowed critic of Mr Oshiomhole, had supported Mr Giadom.
Mr Buhari’s public declaration of support for Mr Giadom has suddenly changed the APC’s internal dynamics. While the president is perceived as not being a natural politician, no party member would want to publicly challenge the president or oppose his choice of party chief.
Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, an APC leader in Rivers and a supporter of Mr Giadom praised the president for taking a position on the contentious leadership tussle. He said that the APC’s NEC should confirm Giadom as the National Chairman while it works towards organising a new executive for the party. He asked party members to sheathe their swords and coalesce around Mr Giadom to strengthen the party.
Giadom’s ascendancy also poses a problem to the APC’s governorship candidate in Edo state Mr Osagie Ize-Iyamu. Mr Iyamu is backed by Mr Oshiomhole who had ensured that his former enemy-turned protege had a clear path to the party’s nomination in Edo. Mr Ize-Iyamu now finds himself in a bit of a quandary since Giadom had publicly rejected the party primaries that led to Mr Ize-Iyamu’s coronation, raising questions about their legality.
Analysts believe that Ekiti’s Governor Dr Kayode Fayemi, the cerebral head of the Nigerian Governorship Forum and Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, one of the president’s most vociferous supporters are the arrowheads of a larger group of powerful governors that counts Jigawa’s Badaru, Kebbi’s Bagudu and Ondo’s Akeredolu as members. The group, which includes other less-visible members, is said to be wary of Mr Oshiomhole’s combative style and his unwavering loyalty to the party’s “National Leader” Ahmed Bola Tinubu, a former governor of Lagos, who is one of Nigeria’s most polarizing svengalis.
Mr Tinubu, one of the most powerful men in Nigerian politics, is widely believed to be eyeing the presidency in 2023 and a formidable coalition of politicians and intellectuals has been trying to stop him. The word in political circles is that powerful Northern dynasts do not want a Tinubu presidency.
President Buhari’s decision to back the faction of the party opposed to former Chairman Adams Oshiomhole and his benefactor Ahmed Bola Tinubu, has effectively altered the balance of power within the APC and suggests that a clearer picture is emerging in the battle for the presidency in 2023.
Tinubu: “Rotimi Amaechi led Giadom faction are coup plotters”
In a related development, Senator Ahmed Bola Tinubu, National Leader of APC has described the Rotimi Amaechi led Giadom faction as coup plotters who launched their attack solely because they perceive the chairman as an obstacle to their 2023 ambitions.
Hear him:
“I am still looking for any National or State Chairman of any political party whether ruling or not that has completely solved all the problems in the party. Even if the party is just a week old.”
“The Chairman has been a tireless campaigner and mobilizer for the party. He has steered the party through difficult elections.”
“His contributions should not be undervalued now that the bulk of elections are behind us.To do so would be an act of ingratitude.
The [coup] plotters launched their attack solely because they perceive the chairman as an obstacle to their 2023 ambitions.”
“In a well-structured society, people come to understand that the time for politics is seasonal; it is periodic.”
“The responsibilities of governance are what are perpetual. Many of our politicians sadly have inverted this reality.”
“We even had a National Deputy Secretary improperly calling for a NEC meeting on the basis that he believed himself to be the acting National Chairman.”
“Clearly, this man would not have summoned the temerity to make such a move had he not been instigated by powerful individuals, whom he thought would reward or, at least, protect him for committing the wrongful act.”
“We must rally around President Buhari, Instead of everyone saying they are working for the party and nation but going their separate ways based on their selfish designs, we must help him build a stronger national consensus on policies that will ensure safety and bring greater prosperity.”
“Many of us expended sweat, tears, toil and sleepless nights to build this party. Our personal sacrifices were not insignificant. We built this party not simply as a vehicle for personal ambition. We built the party because we saw it as perhaps the only enduring hope to bring progressive governance to this nation.”
Those who now seek to abuse the party by using it as their personal device do it great harm. They should not be allowed to sacrifice this collective enterprise at the altar of their self-aggrandizement.
“To be an APC member means more than merely carrying a membership card. It means to believe in a set of ideals and principles geared to our highest purpose as a party and a nation.”
NWC Boycotts NEC, Says Buhari Was Ill-Advised
However, the Senator Abiola Ajimobi-led National Working Committee (APC) has said it will not honour the invitation to attend the virtual Emergency National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting of scheduled for Thursday, stating that President Muhammadu Buhari was ill- advised in approving the meeting.
The NWC made this declaration in a statement signed by Hillard Eta and Waziri Bulama.
Excerpts from the statment reads:
“We wish to unequivocally state that members of the National Working Committee (NWC) believe that the President was offered wrong advice or blackmailed into lending his weighty office to the illegality of the National Executive Committee meeting purportedly convened by one Victor Giadom on 25th June, 2020.
“We hereby respectfully implore Mr President to kindly avail himself with facts of the matter regarding the impasse presently experienced by the Party so as to guide him in his assessment of the matter because we are sure that the President if properly advised, would come to the conclusion that the meeting convened by Chief Victor Giadom bothers on illegality and criminality.
“The National Working Committee (NWC) regrets to turn down the invitation to the illegal and unconstitutional National Executive Committee (NEC) convened by Chief Victor Giadom.
