The APC National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, on Thursday night made nonsense of the recently created Caretaker/Extra-Ordinary National Convention Planning Committee of the APC by President Muhammadu Buhari; saying with ostrich evasion that “there is no crisis in the party, hence, no fight to reconcile,” hence there were no differences to be sorted out in the party.
Tinubu made the startling declaration shortly after a closed door meeting with Yobe state Governor, Mai Mala Buni, Chairman of the APC Caretaker Committee and other members at his Bourdillon residence in Ikoyi, Lagos. Also present at the meeting were: Niger Governor, Abubakar Sani Bello; Secretary of the Committee, Sen. John Akpan Udo-Udehe; Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu and Kebbi State Governor and chairman of the Progressives Governors Forum, Atiku Bagudu.
Although it is public knowledge that the APC has been rocked by leadership crisis which finally saw President Buhari sacking the National Working Committee led by the suspended embattled national chairman, Adams Oshiomhole, a Tinubu loyalist, the APC national leader who was not invited to the meeting last Thursday at Aso Rock kept a straight face to pretend that everything is business as usual.
”We have no differences to be sorted out in the APC; we just had consultation and it is how our party, the APC, would continue to be a progressive party,” he said.
Parsing his words carefully and playing with semantics, Tinubu said the committee in his view, was a consultation and not reconciliation committee since nobody is fighting anybody. ”There are instances when you disagree, but it doesn’t mean that you cannot discuss it over and be a good example in leadership and politics,” Tinubu said.
The former Lagos State governor also said that politics without seeming media crisis would be less interesting. ”But the question is, are we committed to building this party and Nigeria? That is what we are all about. We are steering the ship of our nation and our party in the right direction,” Tinubu said.
He said that the party leadership had trust and respect for the chairman of the caretaker committee and would support him to succeed for the party to continue in its progressive governance of the country. The committee chairman, who led other members to the meeting, said that the meeting was part of the consultation the committee was making.
”You know the task before us is daunting, and we need guidance, experience and prayers from our leaders,” Buni said. The host Governor, Sanwo-Olu, expressed his pleasure to have his colleagues in the state. “It’s been a very fruitful discussion we have had here this evening,” Sanwo-Olu said.
As part of efforts to resolve the crises in the party in the Southwest, the committee first met with Chief Bisi Akande at his country home in Ila-Orangun, Osun State, before proceeding to Lagos to meet Tinubu. The meeting with Akande, a former APC interim national chairman of the party, who heads the party’s National Reconciliation Committee, provided an opportunity for the committee to enlist Akande’s support in its efforts to reposition APC; which some have interpreted to mean reducing Tinubu to political irrelevance. The delegation also sought insight into the work of the reconciliation committee chaired by Akande to serve as a guide for the caretakers in resolving the crises in the party.