By Chidi Levi
Will the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, still remain intact before the next election year, 2023? That is the question members ask behind closed doors.
But not everyone in the party will readily give a yes answer to the question, at least, not some die- hard loyalists of Asiwaju Ahmed BolaTinubu across the country who are insistent that the party as presently constituted, is heavily skewed against their Principal’s alleged 2023 presidential ambition.
The loyalists, this magazine understands, are currently mulling exiting the APC and forming a new party that will be built around Tinubu, a former Lagos state governor and National Leader of the ruling party.
The idea, according to credible sources, is for Tinubu to take a shot at the Presidency on the platform of the new party.
Though this magazine cannnt confirm whether the former Lagos state governor is in league with those canvassing a divorce from the APC, and formation of a new party, he appears not happy with certain happenings in the APC.
Few days after one of his staunchest loyalists and former Osun governor, Chief Bisi Akande, descended heavily on the party over its ongoing membership revaluation exercise, Tinubu himself was to also fault the exercise.
Formidable Forces Are Against Asiwaju in the APC
One of the former Governor’s supporters told this magazine: “I can authoritatively tell you that forces arrayed against Asiwaju in the APC are formidable. They are scared of him. They know he is a formidable politician with countrywide grassroots appeal, they know that in a free contest, the APC presidential ticket will be his for the asking.That’s why they have distorted the party and skewed its structures heavily against him.
“But they will be shocked soon. We are working towards taking the soul of APC from them.We will leave the impotent carcass for them to do whatever they wish”
The Oshiohmole/ Edo Guber Election and Buni Connection
This magazine learnt that the ouster of Adams Oshiohmole as the National Chairman of the APC, his replacement with Yobe state governor,Mai Mala Buni as National Caretaker Committee Chairman, and the party’s defeat in the September 19, 2020 Edo gubernatorial election were seen by Tinubu supporters in the party as clear indicators of orchestrated plots to weaken him politically.
And these, according to them are how:
Oshiohmole: He is Tinubu’s man. Those who plotted his sack knew that with his exit, the Asiwaju would have lost a strong ally and insider in his drive to corner the 2023 APC Presidential ticket.
Edo election: Forces against Tinubu prevailed on the Presidency and the APC, as a party, to allow a free and fair election, knowing that with that, Governor Godwin Obaseki, who had just defected to the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, could easily win.
The calculations were that Obaseki’s win would amount to a crushing defeat for Oshiohmole and Tinubu while the reverse would mean handing Edo on a platter of gold as a political outpost to the APC national leader.
Mala Buni’s National Caretaker Committee: Alien to the APC constitution, a National Caretaker Committee was primarily constituted to undo most of Oshiohmole policies and introduce new ones targeted at certain blocs within the party. Example, the ongoing revalidation exercise.
It was gathered that shortly after the Edo election, several chieftains of the party sympathetic to Tinubu met, reviewed the situation, and thereafter took the decision to pull out and form a new party if the forces in the APC undermining their principal do not draw back.
A Northern Agenda?
Multiple party sources told this magazine that the APC is definitely ceding its 2023 ticket to the South, and most probably to the South west but not to Tinubu. A dark horse is reportedly in the offing as APC’s Presidential candidate. “He is someone who is unstained by the baggage and corrupt tendencies of those angling for the position”, one of the sources confided.
However, a party chieftain from the South west who pleaded not to be named has accused a Northern cabal within the APC of plotting to field a weak candidate of Southern extraction ” so as to hand the presidency back to another Northerner after Buhari via the PDP which will be fielding a Northern candidate”
“This is pure self succession agenda of the North. For them, party does not matter as long as another Northerner succeeds Buhari”, he further stated.
Cards on the Table
Meanwhile, the Tinubu camp is weighing so many options including:
*Outright formation of a new party or merger of like minded parties to form a new party
*Revival of the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN ( a Southwest dominated party with Tinubu as its arrowhead and leader which in 2014, along with other fringe parties, collapsed its structures to form the APC)
*Adoption and rebranding of the Alliance for Democracy, AD (which held sway in the South-west at the dawn of democracy in 1999).
Whichever way, whatever happens, the 2023 Presidential race will be interesting.
