Former Imo Governor Senator Rochas Okorocha has advised President Muhammadu Buhari, Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu and other founding fathers of the All Progressives Congress (APC) should be allowed to determine members of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party.
Okorocha, who spoke while answering questions from reporters in Abuja, said the suggestion if adopted would put the ongoing squabbles in the party to rest.
He insisted that the founding leaders of the party across the original four blocks should be allowed to nominate interested party members for sensitive positions such as National Chairman, National Secretary, Woman Leader, Youth Leader, Organising Secretary, National Auditor and National Legal Adviser among others.
According to him, while Buhari as the leader of the former CPC block should be given the honour of deciding who becomes the next National Chairman of the party, Tinubu of the defunct ACN block, Ogbonnaya Onu of the defunct ANPP block, himself (Okorocha) as leader of the APGA faction then, should also be honoured by allowing them to decide who should occupy the office of National Secretary and others respectively.
He insisted that the equitable sharing the party’s national positions among the leaders will help to douse the current tension in the party.
According to him: “Our party is a great party, APC is a great party, what is wrong with our party is that we have forgotten how we all started, we should not make the mistake of PDP of the old and I think that will be corrected with the party’s Convention now slated for March 26 , 2022.
“What we need to do is to go back to basics so that we adhere to the culture of unity and equity the party was known for at formation in 2013.
“There were four political parties that formed APC. CPC led by the former Head of State, Muhammadu Buhari, who is now the President; Asiwaju Bola Tinubu came with (ACN); Governor Abdulaziz Yari, Senator Alimodu Sheriff (SAS) and former Ebonyi Governor Ogbonnaya Onu who is now Minister of Science and Technology and Rochas Okorocha leading the APGA.
“Our initial position was that all positions would be shared among these four parties and DPP that came with few members and after the merger, the new PDP joined.
“Now, the wisest thing for all of us to do is to go back to the founding basis and distribute the political positions as we did it at that time and there will be no rancour and it will be very peaceful.
“The father of the party now is President Muhammadu Buhari who should be given that respect to pick the person that will hold sensitive position in the party as Chairman.
“Asiwaju Bola Tinubu should always be made to produce some key positions in the party and the other parties should also be made to have positions and when this is done there will be no problem in APC.
“But if we go into elections at this time and of course it will open a pandora of litigations because where 1000 people buy nominations form, APC can make an income of N2billion on sales of forms and after that, APC can spend N3billion on litigations.
“So the wise thing to do is to call the founding fathers of the party and give them key positions and carry everyone along, including the new people that joined the party.” Continue Reading
