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Tag: the African Democratic Congress

  • Delta: ADC Coalition leadership dismisses purported closed-door meeting

    Delta: ADC Coalition leadership dismisses purported closed-door meeting

    The leadership of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) Coalition in Delta State has dismissed reports of an alleged closed-door strategic meeting of the party’s State Executive Committee, describing the report as misleading and not reflective of the party’s current realities in the state.

    In a statement by the Chairman of the Delta State ADC Coalition Leadership Team, George Timinimi, said the report which portrayed Mr. Barbar Ebimowei as substantive state chairman presiding over a meeting ahead of the forthcoming party congress, does not reflect the true position of the party.

    Timinimi said the Delta ADC is currently undergoing a coalition-driven reorganisation process based on inclusiveness, wide consultation, and consensus among stakeholders. He pointed out that any meeting convened without critical stakeholders, coalition partners, and recognised leadership structures cannot be considered the true official position of the party.

    “The leadership of the Delta State ADC at this critical stage is not a one-man affair or a closed-circle arrangement. It is an ongoing effort to reposition the party through the involvement of coalition leaders, elders, and stakeholders committed to building a credible political platform in the state.”

    Timinimi also expressed concerns over claims that the purported meeting was restricted to “duly elected state executive members,” noting that such approach contradicts the party’s commitment to internal democracy, transparency, and fairness. He asserted that secrecy and exclusion have no place in the ADC, particularly at this time that the party is anchored on the unity and reconciliation process.

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    The coalition leadership further warned that no congress process would be considered valid or credible if it is based on unilateral actions, exclusion, or disregard for existing coalition arrangements and engagements with the national leadership of the party. That any attempt to preempt or manipulate the congress process will not be acceptable and contrary to the ADC’s constitution.

    Reaffirming the coalition’s commitment, Timinimi stressed that the ADC Coalition Leadership Team remains dedicated to a transparent, inclusive, and constitutionally guided process that involves all stakeholders across Delta State. He assured party members that the coalition would resist any move that could plunge the party into confusion or undermine the sacrifices of its members.

    He also called on party faithful, the media, and the general public to treat unverified reports with caution, urging them to rely only on officially recognised communications from coalition-backed leadership structures. “The Delta State ADC belongs to all its members, not just a select few,” Timinimi concluded, expressing confidence that the party’s future would be shaped through unity, dialogue, and genuine internal democracy.”

  • ADC faults Tinubu’s police redeployment directive

    ADC faults Tinubu’s police redeployment directive

    The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has criticised President Bola Tinubu’s directive withdrawing police officers from VIP security duties, describing the move as political theatre that will not meaningfully improve national security.

    In a statement on Monday, the party’s spokesperson, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, said the decision reflects a limited understanding of the depth and complexity of Nigeria’s insecurity.

    The party argued that similar directives in the past yielded no results, noting that the measure “makes for good headlines” but does not address the structural deficiencies undermining the security agencies. 

    It added that even if additional officers are redeployed to frontline duties, their training and orientation do not equip them to confront insurgents who have challenged even the military.

    “A country battling terrorism, banditry, mass abductions and violent crime cannot afford to confuse public relations for policy,” the party said.

    It maintained that withdrawing police escorts from VIPs may appeal to public sentiment but fails to treat the root causes of insecurity or strengthen the capacity of security agencies.

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    The ADC also questioned the government’s claim that the directive would free up 100,000 police personnel, demanding clarity on the data, operational plan and logistics required to make such redeployments effective. 

    It further described as puzzling the decision to replace police officers with personnel of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, whose mandate focuses largely on disaster management, community protection and safety awareness.

    The party insisted that Nigeria needs a coherent, modern national security strategy that integrates all security agencies into a coordinated counter-insurgency architecture. 

    It stressed that meaningful progress requires restructuring, re-equipping and retraining the police and other agencies to confront evolving threats, not what it described as cosmetic measures designed for publicity.

    The ADC urged the government to move beyond pronouncements and commit to a comprehensive overhaul of the security system to restore stability and public confidence.

  • ADC’s unending rigmarole

    ADC’s unending rigmarole

    Former vice president Atiku Abubakar was at the African Democratic Congress (ADC) national caucus meeting where it was decided that those who publicly claimed to be members of the party must resign from their previous parties and officially join the ADC. Bolaji Abdullahi, the party’s spokesman, did not give any indication the decision was rancorous. It was, as far as the public knew, unanimous. But more than one week after that decision was taken, Alhaji Atiku was yet to take his own medicine. He is too versed in politics not to recognise an ambiguity when he sees one. He understands that since no deadline was given to take the medication, and since the virus the decision sought to cure remained attenuated, he and other fence sitters were at liberty to malleate the order.

    The ADC has engaged in unending rigmarole since last July when the party burst on the national scene as the preferred, though overused, vehicle of the opposition coalition being cobbled together to challenge the All Progressives Congress (APC), and in particular President Bola Tinubu. It was not until last week or two that party chieftains, nearly all of them external forces who wormed their way into the party and overthrew or compromised its lethargic national leaders, began having confidence that they now had a party they could deploy into action in 2027. The fail-safe All Democratic Alliance (ADA) whose creation they halfheartedly tried to inspire months ago may have finally been abandoned. So, to all intents and purposes, the ADC is the Goliath they will hide behind to fight in 2027.

    But of all those the order to officially register with the ADC was meant to cajole into action, Alhaji Atiku appeared to be the main target. Most of the party’s prominent leaders are already members, including the voluble former Kaduna State governor, Nasir el-Rufai, who straddles the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and the ADC. Repudiated by the SDP, and certain that no big name would follow him when he tempestuously defected to the fringe party, he speaks the language of the ADC more than any other person, including its putative owner, Alhaji Atiku. By remaining unflappable in the face of the order to openly register with the ADC, the former vice president seems to understand something the other leaders in the party don’t. He knows that no creature can be bigger than its creator.

    By last week, no one was left in doubt who the real owners of the party were, or who stood any chance of winning a nomination battle. Alhaji Atiku has allowed and enabled an unending rigmarole in the ADC. He has teased party leaders into making nugatory orders, such as insisting on everybody registering with the party. He has, from the background or incognito, permitted all sorts of orders and regulations to be issued in order to give the impression that the party was not being run dictatorially, but democratically. And he has given everyone in the party a very long rope to hang themselves. He may lack the ultimate strategy to win elections, but he does not lack the strategy to hold a party in thrall and win nominations. He has done it over and over again, and will continue to do it regardless of the reservations many party leaders entertain concerning his suitability for the 2027 presidential poll.

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    In their heart of hearts, and even though they are galled by how they have become a spectacle, most ADC leaders know that they are working for Alhaji Atiku. He has cast his net far and wide in the ADC, and no fish, no matter how smart or big, can escape being snared. The fish themselves know it, and are transfixed by the tactical and financial dexterity of the former vice president. It, therefore, beggared belief that former president Goodluck Jonathan sleepwalked into the ADC waters to explore the possibility of running on their platform. Just one decade of staying out of power since 2015 seems to have inoculated the former president against perceiving the brutal reality of Alhaji Atiku’s make-believe detachment from the ADC’s decision echelon. No one else in the party, not Mallam el-Rufai, not River’s Rotimi Amaechi, nor even the wary and overcautious Peter Obi of the Labour Party, nor still the defiant Rauf Aregbesola of Osun, nor the increasingly tame Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto has let themselves be lured into foolish traps. They know how politically deadly Alhaji Atiku is.One thing is clear, as Alhaji Atiku’s vigorous refutation of the inaccurate reporting of his BBC Hausa interview of last Wednesday indicated, he will vie for the ADC nomination, for he is desperate enough to ignore every tug of conscience and every political sign arrayed against him. If he has engaged in pointless and endless rigmarole, it is because he thinks it serves some short-term purpose, indeed any purpose primed to deliver the presidency to him, his life’s singular obsession. No matter how much the media buffet him with tendentious or sponsored reports, the former vice president will stick to his guns and run for president. And no matter how much his party chieftains cajole him, they are unlikely to ski off-piste without crashing over the cliff. He has charted the path ADC party leaders must follow; and they are caught in a straitjacket. They imperil one another to think they can be extricated from the logjam that undid them in 2023 when they found themselves in the peculiar circumstances of seeing in Alhaji Atiku their only plausible chance to win.