APC’s Conundrum: Good governance or self interest

The call by the APC leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu for the party chairman to resign based on the contentious Ondo State Primary election that ended with the chairman’s submission of the winner’s name to INEC despite the advice of the NWC to conduct fresh primaries has given vent to the popular opinion among many Nigerians […]

The call by the APC leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu for the party chairman to resign based on the contentious Ondo State Primary election that ended with the chairman’s submission of the winner’s name to INEC despite the advice of the NWC to conduct fresh primaries has given vent to the popular opinion among many Nigerians that there is nothing to choose between PDP and APC, the only smidge of distinction is the inviolable capital exemplified by the impeccable integrity quotient of President Muhammadu Buhari.
It befuddles the mind how primary election in one state out of 22 states controlled by APC would elicit change of national chairman. One wonders how many chairmen APC would end up with before 2019.
Nigerian Politicians are so insouciant to historical phenomena the same way the animus for history has led to legislating its abnegation in what has become a national comedy of error.
How can APC within a trajectory of one year tergiversate a three sixty degree into a PDP apostasy on one primary election that seem to expose the overweening self-interests of disparate gladiators.
There seems to be a tripod of discernible political interests (the defunct Action Congress, the old ANPP and the tendentious New PDP) contesting for space in APC and Chief John Oyegun is saddled with a dispassionate management of all. Until these interests are reconciled with Buhari’s nationalist vision of a new Nigeria APC cannot escape the impending implosion.
For instance even if Asiwaju loses any perceived interest in Ondo, Kogi or even Lagos, his present status as the political patron of a party that rescued the Nation from the asphyxiation has towered above such provincial interests. Asiwaju’s compelling legacy would resonate more in joining hand with PMB to foster good governance and not in initiating an endless party chairmanship turn out that would consume the soul of the party.
The second interest in APC tripod of gladiators pulling strings from the presidency may not be helping PMB by being too overbearing on the Chairman. For instance Akeredolu might not be the preferred candidate of Asiwaju but had the capacity to have won a repeated Primary conceived by the majority of the NWC in which case a win-win situation could have saved the day.
The third in the tripod clinching to the straws through the purported manipulation of House Rule of Senate may eventually profit from Asiwaju’s conflict with the presidency.
Be it as it may there is no outcome that favours any of these gladiators because party implosion at the prime stage of this government can only spell doom for good governance which may not spear the presidential legacy.
My advice is for Asiwaju to sheath the sword and work with other stake holders in constituting better future primary elections in the remaining states. The president should call his aides to order and Chief Oyegun should be more circumspect to institutionalize neutrality in subsequent primaries just as he did in the Edo primary.
Chief John Oyegun is too critical and nifty to the ascendancy and success of APC to be replaced at this crucial time of national renewal.
Bukola Ajisola, Lagos, [email protected]