Tag: APC

A leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Ambassador Abayomi Mumuni, has warned that the planned protest across the country may have negative consequences on the economy and other areas of human endeavour.

Mumuni issued this warning in a statement signed by his media aide, Rasheed Abubakar, and made available to journalist, on Wednesday, July 24.

It was learnt that the protest, planned to address the scarcity of food and other essentials, is scheduled for August 1.

In his response, Mumuni appealed to the protesters to embrace dialogue to resolve the issues. 

He emphasised that the protest could harm the country’s economy and may escalate into violent clashes if not properly managed.

Mumuni urged the protesters to cancel the planned demonstration in the public’s best interest and called on the government to engage in dialogue with those involved.

“Dialogue is key in this kind of situation. The people involved should be able to embrace dialogue since we don’t have another country to call ours apart from Nigeria. There should be negotiation between the government and the people involved. 

Read Also: Edo 2024: PDP’s Ighodalo meets with EU delegation to Nigeria

“A peaceful and inclusive approach is key to addressing this problem. The protesters have a right to protest but it must me done in line with the laws of the land. 

“Protest will affect the economy and other social structures. The economy will not be running at that time. This will also have impact on other social structures in the country. 

“Property may also be tampered or vandalized during that time. We all knew what happened during the #EndSARS protest. Some people are yet to get over it up till now. 

“It may escalate into violent clashes between the protesters and security forces, as well as between different groups of protesters with opposing views.

“So, I am appealing to our people to think twice, to shelve the plan. We don’t have any other place to go to apart from Nigeria.”

Senator Ezenwa Onyewuchi (Imo East) of the Labour Party has defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC).

His defection was formally announced on the floor by Senate President Godswill Akpabio.

Onyewuchi, in his letter of defection, cited ‘crisis’ in Labour Party as reason for his action.

Imo State Governor Hope Uzodimma led a delegation of politicians to the Senate to witness the defection and also formally welcome Onyewuchi to the APC.

Similarly, lawmaker representing Ijumu/Kabba Bunu Federal constituency of Kogi State in the House of Representatives, Idris Salman, yesterday announced his defection from the Africa Democratic Congress (ADC) to the APC.

Salman, who is one of the two ADC lawmakers elected into the 10th Assembly, said he is joining the APC after due consultations.

Read Also: We don’t know the party Ameachi belongs to – APC

His defection, which is the first since the House was inaugurated on June 13, 2023, was greeted with loud applause at plenary.

But Minority Whip, Ali Isa JC, asked the House to declare Salman’s seat vacant in accordance with provisions of the Constitution.

According to him, the Constitution provides that any member who defects from the party that sponsored him to the House should lose his seat, especially when there is no crisis in the party.

However, Isa’s position was drowned in a cacophony of voices as the chamber became rowdy with members who did not want his voice heard.

Salman’s defection reduces the number of the minority caucus to 179.

Ahead of the September 21 governorship election in Edo State, the Southsouth Zonal Organising Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Blessing Agbomhere, has urged voters to elect the candidate of the party, Monday Okpebholo.

He spoke in Benin City at the launch of his book titled: ‘40 Leadership Qualities of Monday Okpebholo, A man of Grace.’

The APC chieftain urged the electorate not to be cowed by the propaganda being spread by opponents of Sen. Okpebholo.

He said such comments are not just a distraction from the issues, but are also orchestrated by persons who are afraid of the “towering personality, influence and standards of the APC candidate.”

Read Also: Bandits, other non-state actors now engage in illegal mining, says COAS

According to him, Okpebholo possesses attributes that are lacking in leadership in today’s Nigeria such as integrity, honesty and calmness in the midst of crisis.

Agbomhere, who is also the executive secretary, Akpakomiza Support Group – the campaign structure of the Edo State governorship candidate, said the book, which showcases the hitherto unknown leadership qualities of Senator Okpebholo, will put to rest the prejudices and propaganda by mischief makers, who are challenging his emergence as the candidate of the APC.

• …Aregbesola’s loyalists pledged allegiance to APC 

Defectors from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), led by former Irewole Local Government Secretary Alimi Surajudeen, have joined the All Progressives Congress (APC). 

Also, members of the Alliance Democratic Party (ADP) on Sunday defected to the opposition party, APC alongside loyalists of former governor Rauf Aregbesola who pledged their allegiance to the party on Sunday in Ikire, Osun State. 

Surajudeen hinged the decision to join APC alongside thousands of PDP members on segregation and nepotism by the leadership of the ruling party. 

He said: “When you are in a party and you don’t feel belonging and isolated, and the party is doing things only within their friends and families, it is not a party for the masses, I don’t think I can go along with such a party who doesn’t prioritize dividend of democracy.”

“I was a former Secretary of the local government during Oyinlola’s tenure. A political party is to help the masses and not a group of people. In a situation where out of 100, only two percent are enjoying, such a government is creating suffering and problems for the masses.”

Read Also: We’ve lost a global bridge builder, APC mourns Vietnamese leader, Trong

While receiving defectors, the APC chairman, Tajudeen Lawal boasted that more defectors from the ruling party will join APC in the coming months, stressing that 2026 is a success for the party.

Similarly, the MD/CEO of National Inland Waterways, Bola Oyebamiji, who is ex-finance commissioner, said the defection shows that APC is reckoned with and the party is returning to Osun come 2026. 

He noted: “Since we left the government, the leadership of Adegboyega Oyetola has been very steadfast. None of our members has ever decamped to any party, and today, we have 120 members of PDP, ADP, and TOP that are joining the APC.”

The All Progressives Congress (APC) on Sunday, July 21, said the world has lost a global bridge builder in the death of the Vietnamese political leader, Nguyen Phi Trong.

This was contained in the party’s goodwill message to commiserate with the government and people of Vietnam over the death of their political leader, Nguyen Phu Trong.

Until his passing at 80, Trong was the Secretary General of the ruling Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV).

Vietnamese government on Friday announced the demise of the country’s long-serving leader “after a period of illness”, marking the end of a political era.

The announcement came days after the government said he was stepping back to focus on his health and had handed duties to the president to Lam.

Read Also: Minimum Wage: Okechukwu commends NLC/TUC for saving Nigeria’s democracy

APC national publicity secretary, Felix Morka in a statement in Abuja on Sunday noted the iconic Vietnamese revolutionary leader, devoted his intellect and other resources to the cause of national liberation and reunification.

Eulogising Trong, the APC spokesperson said: “He was pivotal to achieving independence for Vietnam. He was also in the vanguard of the fight against corruption and other vices.

“Nguyen Phu Trong was a bridge builder for development, peace, and international cooperation. At the Party level, he contributed immensely to building the Communist Party of Vietnam, especially the Party building and rectification. His passing, considered a colossal loss to both Vietnam and the international community, marks the end of an era.

“Our prayers and thoughts are with his family, government, and people of Vietnam at this difficult time. We urge the nation of Vietnam to be consoled by the exemplary life and enduring legacies of this rare sage. May the soul of Comrade Nguyen Phu Trong find eternal rest.”

The youth wing of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Plateau State has urged President Bola Tinubu to intervene in the crisis rocking the state House of Assembly.

The group also called for action regarding the replacement of Senator Simon Bako Lalong, who resigned as the Minister of Labour.

In a press statement signed by their coordinator in Jos, Hon. Gwalson Mutshak, the youths demanded the prompt swearing-in of APC House of Assembly members.

Gwakson said: “For the first time in the political history of this country, a sitting governor could call the bluff of an important institution like the judiciary without sanction from any quarters. It is only in Plateau State that the governor openly disrespected the electoral process and the Constitution by refusing to accept the verdict of the election petition tribunal. Instead, the governor formulated his conditions for executing the decision of the Election Petition Tribunal.

“A case in point is the situation where the governor in concert with the Speaker, who incidentally is from a minority party, made it mandatory that for the 16 APC members to be sworn- in, they must first of all, write an undated letter of resignation with an affidavit stating that the decision to do was voluntary.

“This action is not only autocratic, unheard off, but defied all sense of responsibility, democratic norms and political decency from a person who himself, is a product of democracy as well as the rule of law”

The statement also noted: “As things stand out now, 6 members of the APC who have refused to be coarse into that unwholesome condition of signing their resignations letters as a precondition for their swearing-in, are still been denied and refused to be sworn in by the speaker of the Plateau State House of Assembly. Unfortunately, the action of the governor has deprived six constituencies of voices in the legislature for nearly seven months since they won their cases at the election Petition tribunals.

Read Also: Aiyedatiwa’s campaign council mourns Akure LGA’s scribe

“This misuse of power and despicable attitude of the governor has been creating tension and anxiety, to the extent that the patience of most especially, people of the 6 affected constituencies and that of the APC supporters are fast running out, coupled with the kind of provocative innuendoes perpetrated by the Plateau State government.

“Regrettably the APC which holds the ace at the centre has been living politically at the mercy of the PDP to the extent that the APC supporters are denied even palliatives and other forms of social interventions sent to the State by the Federal government. This untoward attitude of the Plateau State government has painfully resonated with the APC and made them look like political orphans in the Country”

The youths also appealed to Tinubu to fill the vacancy left in the federal Ministry of Labour due to the resignation of Senator Simon Bako Lalong.

The statement added: “Permit to also use this opportunity to appeal to Mr President to appoint a Minister from Plateau State. This is to also allow us to have representation at the Federal Executive Council. Mr President should save us from further embarrassment and ridicule by the PDP supporters who constantly delight in making caricatures of us for aligning with the Muslim-Muslim ticket.”

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) lacks moral and political latitudes to point accusing fingers at the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the nation’s economic woes, the ruling party said yesterday.

Rising from the meeting in Egugu on Wednesday, the PDP Governors’ Forum accused the accused the governing party of destroying the economy and faulted the government for delaying minimum wage discussion process.

But the APC yesterday dismissed what it called an outburst of the PDP governors.

Speaking through a statement in Abuja by its National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka, the APC said the opposition party should rather applaud the present administration for ensuring local government financial autonomy, despite its failure to do that during its 16 years rule.

Describing local government autonomy as the most remarkable breakthrough in democratic transformation of the country since 1999, Morka argued that the PDP in 16 years failed to initiate or deliver such reform.

The statement reads: “It is a sad irony that PDP Governors who congregated to discuss the newly won financial autonomy of local governments, the most remarkable breakthrough in democratic transformation in our country since 1999, ended their meeting pointing their scabby political fingers at the APC government that accomplished a reform that the PDP did not and could not initiate, let alone deliver, in all of its desolate 16 years in government. PDP governors are barefaced heirs of a legacy of sleaze and ruin, morally and politically unfit to point fingers.

Read Also: Nigeria seeks to improve Diaspora’s contribution to GDP 

“By their statement, it is now obvious that the PDP governors lack understanding of their place and responsibility in our system of government.

“They do not understand the seriousness of the responsibility that they bear as chief executives of their states to justify the resources at their disposal to build and bolster their domestic economies for the good of their people.

“Rather, the PDP governors speak and carry on as idle spectators and executive free-loaders while blaming the federal government for everything, including their spectacular failure to accomplish the most elementary service delivery to their people. For example, on record, Delta state, governed by the PDP since 1999, is the highest recipient of federal allocation in the country but is emblematic of PDP’s acute corruption, misrule and utter hopelessness with piles of backlog of unpaid salaries and pensions to hardworking citizens of the state.

“The same PDP Governors, many of who have failed to pay legal minimum wage to their workers, hurdled together, without any sense of shame, to accuse the President Bola Tinubu-led administration of delay in approving a new minimum wage for workers.

“These are the same Governors that, only a few weeks ago, publicly proclaimed their inability to pay the proposed new minimum wage due to their workers.”

The statement added: “In a fortuitous NewsFlash at the time of preparing this statement, President Tinubu, Nigeria’s President of Progress, has approved the sum of N70,000 (Seventy Thousand Naira) as the new minimum wage for workers in the country.

“This outcome is the result of the President’s determined leadership of discussions with leaders of organized labour. This will, no doubt, help to ameliorate the transient economic hardship that our people have had to endure in patriotic contribution to building a stronger and more vibrant economy for our country.

“Nigerians do not need to be reminded of the PDP’s inglorious 16 years of odious rule during which the party built nothing that can be remembered or destroyed. The APC-led administration has only saddled itself with fixing the PDP’s mess and institutionalized debilitating corruption of nearly two decades.

“The APC-led administration, through its award-winning Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), His Excellency, Barr. Nyesom Wike, is only now completing and commissioning numerous road projects in the FCT awarded, paid for as far back as 2003 and 2010 but recklessly abandoned by successive PDP administrations.”

The APC pointed out that it has continued to assiduously work for the revitalisation of the petroleum subsidy regime and parallel foreign exchange regimes sustained by the PDP which reckless pillage the country’s commonwealth and blew a gaping hole in the nation’s economy.

The party assured Nigerians that the “enduring dividends of the reforms of President Tinubu’s APC-administration are sure as they are imminent. The transient hardship occasioned by inevitable corrective policies will pale into insignificance in comparison to the enduring prosperity they will bring to all Nigerians.”

The All Progressives Congress (APC) has boycotted the ongoing election in Warri South Local Government Area, Delta State over alleged non-disclosure of electoral materials among others.      

Chairman of APC in Warri South, Mr. Mario Owumi, announced this at the entrance to the Warri South Council Secretariat, during an interview with newsmen. 

Describing the Delta State Independent Electoral Commission (DSIEC) as a “disappointment,” he said the decision was reached following observations made by the party from rightfully asking to see electoral materials and being denied, to the failure of the agents of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to show up.

“Whatever we do here today will affect the government and we don’t want crisis in our land. So we are peacefully protesting and saying strongly that the DSIEC is a disappointment. 

“They are irresponsible, they have disappointed themselves once again. I don’t know what it takes for you to conduct a free and fair election. If you know you’re a party in power, the DSIEC should’ve given us a fair level ground, a free and fair election. But otherwise is the case, obviously. Our people have been itching, tensed. We don’t want to go into violence. As the party chairman in Warri South, I have said ‘no’.

“We will not allow violence in our land, anything that happens here we will suffer it. What they have done this morning is a show of shame. We are highly disappointed as opposition party in Warri South that the DSIEC cannot conduct a free and fair election. The APC family in Warri South strongly says that at this point we will not be part of the process because where we are denied of sighting sensitive materials, we obviously know that they have gone somewhere to thumbprint, write results in their usual way.

“So the party, APC Warri South, we are boycotting the election for these reasons. The PDP, the DSIEC and some of the security agencies are compromised. We have been here since yesterday, we have seen what is going on. So at this juncture, we have said we will not go into violence, we will just boycott the election peacefully. We have told our people to go home,” Owumi said.

Read Also: APC women leader hails Tinubu over 19 percent of women in his cabinet

On his part, the Delta South senatorial chairman of APC, Austin Oribioye, blamed the Delta State Government for the lack of level playing field for political parties in the race.

According to him, Delta state “is a sham because of the kind of politics we play here that does not allow fairness and equity to thrive. If we allow people to exercise their franchise, vote their candidate, nobody will pick anything against the government. Delta State is the least in development so far. Because we have the wrong people in government.

“From ’99 till date, look at what is happening. With all the funds, all the resources, look at where we are. We are calling on the authorities that Delta State must change.”