APC Caucus Refuses To Endorse Buhari – Yakubu Dogara
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The National Executive Committee, NEC of the All Progressives Congress on Tuesday rejected the automatic ticket for President Muhammadu Buhari ahead of 2019 general elections.

Briefing the newsmen at the end of the meeting, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara and National Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi, said that the NEC deferred deliberations on the consensus candidacy

According to Dogara, “Even though there was a motion in the floor that calls for a vote of confidence on the President, some of us felt it was not necessary because there is nowhere that his confidence is shaking. But the motion was taken and passed. But there was a second leg to that motion which calls for the adoption of the candidature of the President, but it was deffered for now and no decision was taken because that is not the major reason why we are here.”

Dogara also said that there was no definitive and conclusive date on the party convention because “it is something in the work and judging from yesterday’s meeting, I understand that the party will fine tune this and then there will be another round of meeting where the specifics and details will be approved.”

‎On the issue of aggrieved members in the party, he said, “I don’t think that you can find any family that is as large as the APC family without some squabbles. No such family exists in the whole world and if there are disagreements, they are okay because without disagreements, you cannot even move forward. Progress comes when people refuse to agree with the status quo and they put forward their positions. If their positions are good enough, they are adopted and we move forward.

“So, for us, I don’t think we are having a situation or run into a situation whereby we have crisis that the party cannot overcome. What I will advocate is that we should be the ones as the APC family to define what type of crisis and not allow crisis defines us. So, we will do everything possible to reach out to whoever is aggrieved. We are not like other parties that will say to hell with you because we value every member of this family. If we have members of the family who have grievances, we will do everything possible to reach out to them and attempt to bring reconciliation. I believe that with God on our side, we should be able to overcome.‎”

He said that the meeting was for stock taking and to remind themselves of the covenant they made with the people of Nigeria, review how well the party has done and what they need to do in order to deliver on the promises they made during campaign.

“I can tell you that after a very illuminating address by the party chairman, the President took turn to address the NEC members and he was very clear in his vision about where we are taking Nigeria to and we reminded ourselves about the achievements we have recorded in terms of combating terrorism in the North East, the fight against corruption which is one area where we are doing very well and the exiting from recession and the achievement the party has recorded. While we can say we have done quite a lot, there is still much to be done… The resolve is that we should rededicate ourselves as a party to the service of our people and the only thing that we guarantee our place in this country is the service we render to our people.”

Also speaking Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi said one of the NEC members said we should move a motion passing a vote of confidence on Mr. President. There was no formal motion moved on the issue of second term for Mr. President.

“Somebody in the crowd shouted that we should move a motion and we don’t even know that member. But the motion that was formally moved was that NEC should pass a vote of confidence on Mr. President and that was after the brief given by the Minister of Agriculture, especially when he said that by 2018, Nigeria will have no need to import a single grain of rice. That is the context and I need you to understand that very well.

“The only discussion or conversation on 2019 was the activity of the party in 2018, especially the issue of convention. It was agreed that since we have all these activities lined up, including the mini convention, congresses and elective convention, a small team be set up to put dates to these party activities up to 2018. There was no discussion about election of 2019 or who will be the party flag bearer. The committee will decide when all these activities will take place.”

The NEC also passed absolute vote of confidence on National Chairman Chief Odigie-Oyegun and the NEC.

Meanwhile President Muhammadu Buhari assured that his government will soon shake up his cabinet and inject new blood. In his welcome address, President Buhari said, “Last year I said we would re-constitute the Boards of Parastatals. I must regret the fact that we have not done so, for many reasons. “Some of us in this meeting may know I had given instructions since October 2015 for this exercise to start. But there have been inordinate delays through several committees in an attempt to get the balance right and to make sure all parts of the country are equitably represented.

“On the other hand I am keenly aware that our supporters are very eager for these appointments to be announced. By the Grace of God these appointments will be announced soon. Especially now that the economy is improving, we will have the resources to cater for the appointees. By the same token the compressed Federal Executive Council will be expanded to bring in more supporters at Federal level, with fresh ideas to be injected into the government.”

The President also thumped up his government in the last two years in the area of “Boko Haram, Niger Delta, Regular Fuel, Improved Power, TSA, Agriculture and Fertilizer, above all, the knowledge that corruption will not be tolerated in this government. We all know there is CHANGE.”




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The southern Governors meeting held in Lagos two weeks ago is part of ongoing alliances between different parties in the South to vote as one block in 2019 presidential election