War in APC: Nigerians react
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| Oyegun and Tinibu |
Unongo Paul (A former Minister of Steel) At 81 years of age, I am not a novice in Nigerian politics. I have spent over six decades participating actively in politics. So, I know much about the trend of Nigerian politics. We can look at what is
happening in the All Progressives Congress in different ways. At my level, I believe it is good for democratic practice in Nigeria.
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| Unongo paul |
Whenever there is a controversy, Nigerians are scared, especially when the political party that is involved is the ruling party. People are scared that the crisis could destabilise the party. Are we supposed to have a party of sycophants that does not get destabilised? The problem of Nigeria’s political party structure from evolution is lack of internal democracy.
In relation to this, there is a phenomenon where a few people attempt to capture the structure of a political party and impose their will on the party.
Also, when two critical members of a political party in the persons of Bola Tinubu and John Odigie-Oyegun open up to the public, the assumption is that they must have discussed the issues at the highest level of the party over and over without reaching an agreement. The disagreement could be over the need to follow the party’s ideology.
Should the APC, the leftist party, suffer from the ills that the Peoples Democratic Party appears to have suffered from? Should the leader of the party who suffered a lot to build the party sit down and watch the party being destroyed? I think Tinubu might have weighed the fact that he is a national leader of the party; he might have made failed attempts to resolve the issues internally before coming to the public. People might have said, “Don’t disgrace the party.” But we should understand that a political party is not a religious organisation. It is an ideological creation of man to manage political affairs. And if the APC has deviated from its ideology, somebody has to draw our attention to that. Nigerians should not see this as a destabilisation but a struggle to restore internal democracy.
Femi Okurounmu (A former senator/chairman, Presidential Advisory Committee on 2014 National Conference) I have always said that the APC is not a political party. It is a congregation of political gamblers, people who came together with the intention to capture power for their selfish interests. That is why you would notice that the party is threatened each time the ambition of an individual leader of the party is threatened.
The union is not a stable one as all the members are seeking different goals. There is no group agenda. Bola Tinubu’s agenda is personal; John Odigie-Oyegun’s agenda for the party is personal. The same thing applies to the other leaders of the party. National agenda is minimal on the party’s programme.
I am not surprised that they have started fighting one another. I am not surprised that Tinubu is attacking Odigie-Oyegun. That should be expected from a party that is populated by people who feel it is their turn to loot the country.
It is in the interest of Nigeria for the party to disintegrate. It is also in the interest of Nigeria for the Peoples Democratic Party to disintegrate as well. This would lead to the emergence of new political parties that are focused on redeeming Nigeria. The two leading political parties are groups of looters. They do not have the interest of Nigerians at heart. They are only concerned about the interest of their leaders. Nigeria would experience the beginning of progress the day the two parties fall apart.
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