…calls for emergency National Convention
Following the February 25 presidential and National Assembly elections, a crisis of confidence has hit the All Progressives Congress as its National Vice Chairman, North-west, Salihu Lukman, on Friday, called for an emergency National Convention for the purpose of electing a new national leadership for the ruling party.
In a statement, Lukman also demanded the resignation of the APC National Chairman, Senator Abdullahi Adamu and the National Secretary, Senator Iyiola Omisore.
According to him, with a National Chairman who is also a Muslim, it will be important that every necessary step is taken to inject a change of leadership in the party so that a new National Chairman, who is a Christian, can take over.
Lukman noted that one advantage of this is that the National Chairman’s position could still be retained in the North-Central.
He said the current APC National Chairman has done an excellent job by managing a successful campaign to win the 2023 elections with all the attendant challenges, it shouldn’t difficult to convince Adamu to resign as National Chairman to give room for a new National Chairman, who is a Christian, to emerge.
Lukman’s statement read, “For that to happen, it may require an Emergency National Convention because if the hierarchy of the current leadership is to be followed, the successor to Sen Adamu will be Sen Abubakar Kyari, who is a Muslim from the North-East.”
The vice chairman pointed out that apart from changing the national chairman, there was the need to also recognise the case of the National Secretary of the party, describing him as a source of stronger dispute in Osun State.
He said rather than serving as a unifying factor for the party leadership in Osun State, Omisore had become more of a divisive factor, which might have been responsible for APC’s loss of the 2022 governorship election to a political mediocre whose only qualification in politics may appear to be a comic dancing skill.
Lukman argued that to save Osun State and bring it back to its old standard of national political reckoning, Omisore would need to resign as APC National Secretary and a new unifying National Secretary elected.
He said in addition to Omisore, any member of the National Working Committee of the party who is not a unifying leader in his/her state should be changed.
“For that to happen may require an Emergency National Convention because if the hierarchy of the current leadership is to be followed, the successor to Sen. Adamu will be Sen. Abubakar Kyari who is a Muslim from North-East,” Lukman said.