A group, Concerned All Progressives Congress (APC) Stakeholders, has questioned President Muhammadu Buhari’s power to extend the tenure of the party’s National Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee.
The committee, led by the Governor of Yobe State, Mai Mala Buni, was inaugurated on June 25, 2020 to run the affairs of the party after the sacking of the Adams Oshiomhole-led National Working Committee (NWC) following a protracted leadership crisis.
However, the tenure of the committee that was supposed to be for six months to reconcile aggrieved members and conduct convention for the party has now been elongated for the third time.
Reacting to the tenure elongation, the spokesperson of the group, Mr. Abdullahi Dauda, said his group disagreed with the tenure elongation given to the committee, saying the party is not a one-man show.
He said: “About the tenure elongation given to the Buni committee, we totally disagree because this party is not a one-man show or investment. APC as a political party is an institution governed by a constitution, anything out of the constitution, we will not agree, and everybody has to think.”
He wondered why a party that promised to respect law and order, decided to discard its own constitution in order to grant an extension to the committee.
Dauda said: “As I am talking to you now, we are just coming out from a meeting about the issue, we are not happy. With due respect to Mr. President, he has no power; even the constitution has not given him such power without the National Executive Council (NEC). But the problem is from those people; they only went to the president and lied to him.”
According to him, he sometimes wondered why Buhari, who is known as a man of principle, can take such a decision since the party is not a one-man investment.
“How can one man make a decision without proper consultation with NEC? It is totally wrong,” he said.
Dauda stated: “We are going to draw the attention of the president and the party elders. As a party member, you have to write a letter to the party leaders and the president because they misguided the president. That’s why he made that decision. Maybe Mr. President doesn’t know anything about the constitution of the party.”
Asked if the decision would be challenged in court, he said they would decide on the next line of action when the time comes.
Dauda added: “There is nowhere in the constitution that gives Mr. President the right to give them tenure elongation. Mr. President is always claiming he is a man of principle, he is a man of law and order, where is the law and order, where is the principle for violating the constitution?”
