…Threaten sabotage
Some outgoing governors of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) have threatened to sabotage the presidential campaign of their party and its candidate, Bola Tinubu, in their respective States.
The aggrieved governors, under the aegis of the Progressive Governors’ Forum (PGF), accused the party and its candidate, Tinubu, of disregarding their nominations to the presidential campaign council.
The Secretary to the APC campaign council, James Faleke, announced the constitution of the campaign council, at the weekend, listing 422 members, including many who are to work at the regional and State levels for Tinubu and his running mate, Kashim Shettima’s success in the 2023 presidential election.
Before then, the party’s leadership had contacted the governors, through the PGF secretariat, to nominate individuals in their respective States to be members of the presidential campaign council, sources with direct knowledge of the request revealed.
The governors were said to have been requested to nominate five persons each. However, they were reportedly stunned to see that Tinubu and the party ignored their nominations and replaced them with others from their respective States without consulting them.
According to some top officials in the party, the governors had been inundating the PGF chairman and governor of Kebbi State, Atiku Bagudu; the APC chairman, Abdullahi Adamu, and the Director-General of the PGF secretariat with complaints over the constitution of the campaign council.
The North-West governors, particularly, are said to be threatening to withdraw their support should they continue to be disregarded.
According to sources, the disagreement is creating an opportunity for the presidential candidate of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, to strategise for the backing of the North-west APC governors.
Controversies had trailed the release of the party’s campaign council list on Saturday.
When the Secretary to the APC campaign council, was contacted by newsmen to know what the campaign council is doing to address the governors’ agitations, Faleke did not respond to calls placed to his mobile phone. He also failed to respond to a text message inquiring about efforts being made by the party to stem the looming sabotage.
