‘No membership registration without BOB’ – Kwara APC Youth
All Progressive Congress youth in Kwara State have kicked against the suspension of the state caretaker chairman, Hon. Bashir Omolaja Bolarinwa by the national secretariat of the Party.
THE INFORMANT247 earlier reported that Secretary of the National Caretaker Committee of the APC, Senator John Akpanudoedehe told some Kwara APC stakeholders in Abuja on Wednesday.
Addressing a news briefing on the development flanked by other stakeholders on Wednesday, a chieftain of the Party, Akogun Iyiola said, “We heard it as a rumour until we came face to face with the Secretary of the National Caretaker Committee of the APC, Distinguished Senator John Akpanudoedehe on the 12th day of January 2021. It was the Secretary that told us that APC has dethroned our Chairman, Hon Bashir Omolaja Bolarinwa on the 11th of January 2021, by giving a letter of appointment to his Deputy, Hon Samari Abdullahi.”
Reacting to this development at a Press Briefing held at the state party secretariat in Ilorin on Thursday, the youth, under the aegis of the Concerned Youth Stakeholders of APC Kwara State Chapter, rejected Bolarinwa’s removal, tagging it as “illegal”.
They said, “The recent developments in Kwara APC, sad as it is, is returning Kwara to the bad old days of naked wielding of political power by few privileged to overrun the wishful will of the people, more so in a party that prides itself as ‘a progressive party’. It is now glaring to every Kwaran of good conscience irrespective of ethnicity, religious inclination, political affiliation and creed that “OUR LOCAL DEMOCRACY IS BACK IN GRAVE DANGER”! It is sad that we are at the verge of deviation from our long walk to a politically freed Kwara and a highway leading to progress. WE ARE NOW ON A JOURNEY TO THE DIRECTION OF AN ABYSS OF ANARCHY!
“We wish to let the whole nation know that we find ourselves in a situation where the “soul of our collective struggle”, which was proudly christened as ” O TO GE” (Enough is Enough) is been sacrificed in the most Machiavellian manner on the Altar of Politics of selfish interest and desire for more power by a handful few individuals and their collaborators in the corridors of power.
“Some individuals who by providence and our collective sacrifice occupies enviable positions today as Governors of APC controlled States in Nigeria, have chosen to constitute themselves as impostors, collaboratively violating the constitution of our Party and exhibiting sheer disregard for known and acceptable norms and tenets of intra party democracy, in a bid to foist one of their own upon Kwara State, a State of more than 3 million inhabitants and a party populated by people of substance who chose to take their destiny and that of Kwara State in their own hands. They resorted to crookedly effect the most vicious kind of political coup via replacing void of due process, the Caretaker Leadership of Kwara State. This is anything but moral and an affront to the sensibilities of common APC members in our dear Kwara State.
“Awoken to the unfathomable news that Hon. Bashir Omolaja Bolarinwa, who was inaugurated and sworn into office as Caretaker Chairman of Kwara State State Chapter of All Progressives Congress on 11th December, 2020, has been suspended and subsequently removed from office on 13th January 2021, without any prior properly instituted allegation in accordance to our Party Constitution against him to our common knowledge. Even the Governor of Kwara State who allegedly claimed he cannot work with Hon. Bashir Omolaja Bolarinwa recently affirmed his Chairmanship of the Party, after one of the several botched attempts to desperately oust him failed.”
They pointed that Bolarinwa was appointed as a caretaker chairman by a resolution of the National Executive Council of the APC after the dissolution of the State Executive Councils, adding that the dissolved executives were then returned in caretaker capacities in order to administer the affairs of the Party and prepare the grounds for the Party’s next convention.
They furthered, “We had hoped and expected every politician of conscience worth his or her onions will play by the rules to ensure a popular party leadership is installed at the conventions. We are however estranged when another letter surfaced on social media purportedly appointing Hon. Abdullahi Samari as Kwara APC Caretaker Chairman, allegedly because “Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq claimed he is not comfortable working with Hon. Bashir Omolaja Bolarinwa”, which resulted to certain of his Governor colleagues to use an unknown North Central veto to flagrantly rubbish the resolutions of the National Executive Council of the APC, and in fact nullify as it were, the decision of the NEC, which consists of President Muhammadu Buhari.
“Who are all these VIPs? And what makes them believe they possess the right to determine our fate as Kwara Citizens and members of APC Kwara State Chapter? Just like we demonstrated in the past against oppressive political tendencies, we shall not waiver in contending with any such action that does not resonate with fairness, justice and equity for all.”
The youth further insisted that no membership registration will be allowed to hold until Bolarinwa is reinstated as the caretaker chairman.
They continued, “We would also like to be educated on when it became a democratic norm for 2 individuals to remove a sitting Caretaker Chairman, without the input of the properly constituted NEC of APC?
“It is also necessary to ask who precisely is the leader of the APC at National level, is it Mr. President or our ‘Powerful State Governors’ and whoever the leader is, is authoritarianism and anarchy an ideal of such a person and invariably that of our party, the APC?
“It is so sad that right before our eyes, the instructions of our President are being usurped by two individuals, in this case the Governor of Kwara State AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq and his Niger State Counterpart, Sanni Bello.
“Permit us to put the entire Nation on notice because a very unacceptable and dangerous precedence is about to be laid in our Country. A precedent in which the fate of the entire Citizenry of Nigeria, is now in the hands of a few power drunks holding the grip of the APC! It is so sad that APC Governors in Nigeria have turned themselves into a cabal that believes they have absolute powers even to overrule the decisions of a sitting President and trample upon the wishes of the card carrying members of the APC. This action is clearly in contradiction of the constitution of our party which places supreme powers on the NEC of our party and thus made the reversal of any of its decisions impossible except by the convention of our great party.
“Section 13 subsection 3 reads “The decision of the National Executive Council is binding on all organs and all members of the party, except the National Convention”.
“This is why we want to know where the Buni led national caretaker committee, his Governor friends and others derived their power to override the resolution of NEC, if not that they feel impunity is the way to go. We say to them, this illegality and rape of our party’s constitution will NOT STAND!
“Without any doubt, we are currently witnessing a situation whereby as a State, we are being returned back to totalitarianism and one man domination which the electorate in Kwara State mobilized to defeat through the O TO GE revolution in the 2019 General Elections. Today, we witness a situation where our rights are being infringed upon. Tomorrow, if we don’t act to check these inequities, what we are likely to experience is a situation where we will again have our political liberties hijacked all over again by one man.
“Without mincing words, what we are witnessing in Kwara State APC today is not only shameful but highly unacceptable and it will be resisted by whatever means we deem necessary. Permit us to reiterate that this press conference is not to caste any slur against our Governor over his “non performance”. We are merely saying that we are not going to allow “our right to choose” to be taken away from us.
“On this note, let it be clear that whatever it is that has been agreed to by our Governor and his collaborators will never stand in our dear Kwara State. WE HAVE RESOLVED TO EXPLORE EVERY MEANS POSSIBLE TO ENSURE THAT THIS SACRILEGE DOES NOT STAND.
“Finally, we appeal to our dear President, His Excellency, Retired Major General Muhammadu Buhari to rise up and address this injustice and save Kwara State from being thrown into an Abyss of Anarchy.”
