₦airaland Forum

The National Secretary of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Dr Ajibola Basiru has revealed that the party primary election is not a true avenue of picking its candidate but through a selection by party hierarchy.

He disclosed this in a viral video on social media, where he appeared to be holding a meeting with members of the party.

In the video, Basiru who was speaking in Yoruba language, disclosed that the party candidates for President, Senate and House of Representatives will be uploaded by the National Secretariat, hence, described mockery about some aspirants not winning primary as a mere joke.

His words, “If you claim candidate(s) did not win primary, who will upload the name(s), it is mere child’s play. Claims that someone emerge in primary is a ruse, we know there is no primary.

“We don’t hold primary in our party. We pick those that we want to pick. The claim of a winner of a primary is false”, he said.

In the said video, he even asked a former lawmaker if he emerged through a primary election and the lawmaker replied that he was picked inside he government house.

Meanwhile a statement that emerged from the meeting revealed that the APC scribe cautioned party members from insulting or abusing civil servants in the State as they are critical to the party’s success at the August 15 governorship poll.

“Civil servants are enlightened people. They are respected in their communities, and people listen to them because they understand governance and leadership.

I have enormous respect for them, and nobody has the authority to insult them in the name of our party,” he said.

Bashiru appealed to workers in the state not to direct their grievances against the APC over comments made by individuals acting on their own.

“I want to appeal to our civil servants not to use their influence against the APC because of careless statements from some individuals.

“Those comments are personal opinions and not the official position of our party,” he said.

Bashiru also warned APC members and candidates against complacency ahead of the governorship election, insisting that victory would only come through hard work, unity and reconciliation within the party.

“I don’t believe in automatic victory. There is nothing like that in politics. We must work in every ward and every polling unit, and we must appeal to those who are aggrieved,” he said.

Primaries don’t decide candidates, @OfficialAPCNg leadership does, says national secretary pic.twitter.com/pdnwXpBzca

— Vanguard Newspapers (@vanguardngrnews) May 31, 2026

SadiqBabaSani:
APC is the worst political party to hold power in Nigeria since inception to date, Abacha was better than this guys in some ways

He came to tell them to vote Peter Obi and Kwankwaso as Vice.

Kano youths became angry.

This is a clear rejection of Kwankwaso as Vice to Peter Obi. pic.twitter.com/C9Cagh93Ld

— High Chief Lawrence Igbins Okoro (@HighChiefOkoro) June 1, 2026

He came to tell them to vote Peter Obi and Kwankwaso as Vice.

Kano youths became angry.

This is a clear rejection of Kwankwaso as Vice to Peter Obi. pic.twitter.com/C9Cagh93Ld

— High Chief Lawrence Igbins Okoro (@HighChiefOkoro) June 1, 2026

Ofunaofu:
APC under Tinubu has deviated from the ideals of its founding fathers and has become a baba sope political patronage machine fused with drug cartel mentality

Imagine spending so much, buying nomination and expression of interest forms, engaging party members, and even winning a primary, only to discover that your name was never uploaded by the party hierarchy as a candidate.

Gotocourt:
Baba sope dirty politricks, this is what will finally bury APC 📌

Ofunaofu:
APC under Tinubu has deviated from the ideals of its founding fathers and has become a baba sope political patronage machine fused with drug cartel mentality

Imagine spending so much, buying nomination and expression of interest forms, engaging party members, and even winning a primary, only to discover that your name was never uploaded by the party hierarchy as a candidate.

Ofunaofu:
This is to further tell you that Tinubu, the NADECO wannabe was never a democrat

anonimi:
My dad, victim of complex conspiracy – Kola Abiola

What role did Bola Tinubu play in all of these?

At the very beginning, he was part of the Yar’Adua PF group from Jos. He was a senator then, and as far as the group went, we related. The crisis started post-election. When Abacha came, one of the things he wanted to do was to be the administrator for Lagos.

That is Tinubu?

Yes. I am sure you have seen pictures of him and my dad. He was hoping that there would be civilian administrators like we had under IBB but Abacha said no, that he was going to have military administrators. So he (Tinubu) said okay, in that case, can I be a deputy administrator? But Abacha said that there wouldn’t be deputies. Then he wanted the post of a commissioner.

He wanted to be a commissioner?

Yes. Then it was a choice between him and someone very close to Jakande who has passed on now. I can’t remember his name, but because Babagana was already in the government, that guy was picked as commissioner. But really, Senator Tinubu had lost out already.

Was Tinubu very close to MKO?

Yes, he was close enough. He and Adeniyi Adele, a very good guy, were close to my father. In fact, Adeniyi was closer to my father and more dedicated to the process than anyone of them. When my documentary comes out, you will see Tinubu’s take on issues. So once he lost out, automatically, he became a NADECO member and Adeniyi was incarcerated.

https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2019/06/12/my-dad-victim-of-complex-conspiracy-kola-abiola/

samwash:
What was the need of conducting the primaries the first place, when the party hierarchy can just hand pick whosoever want to represent the party in various positions.
Why waste the funds and the ppls time.

Do APC ever have an ideology, what was ideal of the founding fathers other than to grab the power and loot the resources of the state. Is Tinubu not among the founder of the APC.

Babasessy:
The Awolowo rebirth in the Southwest has inspired gongs, songs and rhetoric of sorts. But they have missed one point.

It occurred to me in Abeokuta last week amidst the big crowds and euphoria of the swearing-in of Senator Ibikunle Amosun as governor. In all the states from Lagos to Edo, where Awo has witnessed ideological resurgence, hardly a single family member has played a role.

So we have an Awo family without an Awo. That is an irony. But history overwhelms us with this sort of twist. Obafemi Awolowo toiled for his reputation. His roots were lowly, he toiled to school both home and abroad, launched into careers in law, business, journalism and eventually politics. He carved a niche for himself, and became the first methodical and charismatic leftist in our history.  Other leftists abounded but they did not inspire comparable drama and following.

He faced tribulations, went to jail, failed in elections, won a few, but he imprinted his ideas and legacy in the country, and no single mortal has beaten him in the history of this country. His greatest achievement was in the area of ideas, and that was how he fashioned a family. Most families are born of biology but his issued from ideology. That family suffered with him.

In a spoof of Jesus Christ, these were the men who followed him in his teachings, and endured with him in his temptations. So he formed a kingdom for them in the Southwest, in the old Western Region, presiding over his projects, his legacies and people.

In all of these, the family he had was not his flesh and blood. In another spoof of Christ, who were his family anyway? Those who were with him must be counted as his family. So, I combed in the ambience of Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN), and I found none. I went to Ogun, I frisked the crowd under Amosun’s bower, hardly any. Around Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola in Osun, I could not lay a finger. With Governor Kayode Fayemi in Ekiti, where are the forbears of Awo? Yet, I can hear the chants of Awo. Hardly in any of the inaugural speeches or any of their other public intervention would you miss the philtre and filter of Awo from these gentlemen. To parody Novelist Joseph Conrad, they are the sparks from Awo’s sacred fire, the messengers of the might within the man.

Already all of them are pursuing the legacy ideas of Awo: free education, free health services, infrastructural development, urban renewal and economic engineering.

Lagos has posted itself as the John the Baptist. The others are putting up valiant efforts, and the world of course is watching to see how well they will perform. It will call for great work, resourcefulness and cooperation. They are the real Awoists, and Awo was a man of rigour and vigour.

The Awo son that many expected to take after the father was Olusegun, who unfortunately died in a car crash. We shall never know if he could have pulled it off.  But the others have not shown much of the paterfamilias’ brio and depth. In the past decade, under this republic, they have blended with the wrong crowd. Even H.I.D, hobnobbed with Alao-Akala, who brought illiteracy to governance; with Oyinlola who turned the grace of office into a hell-hole of despots; with Daniel who could not arrest his quick fall into megalomania.

I wrote once that this woman whom Awo once described as the jewel of inestimable value has lost value to his cause. If he came back to life, he would have committed the extraordinary act of divorce after death. Even his newspaper, The Tribune, has so stumbled and fallen that it swims in Awo’s vomit.

                                                                             http://www.thenationonlineng.net/2011/index.php/columnist/monday/sam-omatseye/index.1.html

Macphenson:
Even Buhari is more democratic than PBAT.

SadiqBabaSani:
APC is the worst political party to hold power in Nigeria since inception to date, Abacha was better than this guys in some ways