Romanus Ugwu, Abuja
Fresh crisis is brewing in the All Progressives Congress (APC) as Deputy National Chairman (North), Lawal Shuaibu, has kicked against the recent appointment of Waziri Bulama as acting National Secretary, describing it as a nullity.
Apparently reacting to Bulama’s inauguration, he argued that there was nowhere in the party’s constitution it was stipulated that an officer of the party could be appointed by the chairman or the NWC.
Shuaibu, in a statement issued in Abuja, also faulted the party’s guidelines for the Edo, Ondo primaries, warning that the incidence that denied APC tickets in Zamfara State during the 2019 general elections will repeat itself if the national leadership goes ahead with the released guidelines.
“The APC Constitution in Article 20(a) made it unambiguously clear, that All Party Posts prescribed or implied by this constitution SHALL be filled by democratically conducted elections at the respective convention (in the case of NWC or NEC) or congress (in the case of Executive Committees at State, Local Government or ward levels) et tal.
“There is nowhere in that same constitution where it was envisaged that an officer of the party could be appointed by the Chairman nor the NWC.
“Not even NEC has the power to appoint any National officer of the party in any capacity. Let me ask this simple question, what is difficult in organising a mid term convention to elect the officers in line with the constitution so that even the officers will have confidence that they are elected like all other officers.
“All NWC officers have offices of their deputies to take charge of that office in the absence of the principal, in consonance with article 14 of the constitution in its entirety. But what is happening to this Constitutional provision? Does it have a different legal interpretation?”
Issuing a battle cry to the chieftains of the party to rescue the party from the impending doom, Shuaibu said: “The leaders need to take a stand so that the followers know whether the party is now either a jungle or that entity of our collective dream at the inception. Majority of the members of the party are already perplexed, disillusioned and some even weighing their options. A stitch in time, I believe, saves nine.”