Why ADC is not bothered about INEC’s claims – Nwosu
Pioneer national chairman and founder of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) Ralph Nwosu, in this interview with Trust TV, spoke on why the leaders of the party are not bothered about the decision by INEC not to monitor the party’s national convention among other issues. A group of state chairmen of your party support […]
Pioneer national chairman and founder of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) Ralph Nwosu, in this interview with Trust TV, spoke on why the leaders of the party are not bothered about the decision by INEC not to monitor the party’s national convention among other issues.
A group of state chairmen of your party support the decision of INEC to de-recognise the David Mark leadership. Though they said they are not loyal to any of the two sides, they are now throwing their weight behind what they call the leadership of Dumebi Kachikwu. At what point dii Dumebi Kachuku become a national leader of the ADC? And what do you make of this resolution of the state chapters?
It’s unfortunate. We don’t have factions in the ADC, I can tell you that.
You mean including that of Nafiu Bala?
We don’t have any factions in the ADC. All that you’re seeing are footprints of the present government.
- David Mark-led ADC wants court to reverse INEC’s decision
- 2027: Don’t pull down democracy, Arewa Think Tank, CSOs caution opposition
Do you have evidence to back this claim?
I can tell you that 100%. I’m one of the principal persons who put together this coalition, and I know the depth of pressure on me personally. I know how I was able to put them off. But having said that, the coalition, we get a lot of intelligence. In ADC, we have the former vice president, we have senators, we have former governors, we have a lot of retired police top ranks. Retired military top ranks. Name them.
So they’re providing you with the necessary intelligence?
Our intelligence committee is top-notch. So we have information, and we know everything that’s happening, and we are prepared to deal with it.
And by the grace of God, we have a disciplined leader in the person of David Mark. When certain decisions were made and David Mark and Rauf Aregbesola were presented to be chairman and secretary, some younger people said, oh, why, they are too old, we need younger persons. These persons will not be able to handle the pressure of now.
But we knew more than a year ago, that this thing will be this way. And we are prepared for it. The leadership they are providing is helping us to navigate all the way.
Number one, Dumebi Kachikwu came to ADC to run for the presidency. Somehow, some people used him, and he was able to win the primaries. And since he won the primary, he started to do the job they planted him in ADC to do.But 2023 is gone. Being presidential candidate is not a lifetime ticket. You wasted that ticket for us, leave us alone.
And it’s the same party chairman that he took to try to cause us havoc in 2023. That’s the same chairman, he has been able to mobilise to go and get. Before then, he had reportedly gone to court. About a month ago, the court threw away his suit and so on. Then we decided we want to do congress. David Mark was magnanimous.
He said, OK, all of the state chairmen that were there, let them stay to the end so that they have the congress. If they win the congress, they come back. If they don’t win, they go.
He didn’t want to dissolve them. OK, so this is time for congress. Possibly some of them who are not popular on ground are now coming together. Dumebi has shown them, oh, we have resources now. I don’t know if you are aware of the anti-coalition budget.
I’m not aware. Where is it? Where is it domiciled?
There is an anti-coalition budget. It’s domiciled with the operatives of APC.
Who are these operatives?
You go and ask the people who collapsed all the state houses, all the PDP state governors, all the state governors.
You mean there is a specific budget set aside for this destruction?
Actually, I’m surprised. I think you’re just pulling my leg, but frankly, you know, there are some good people still in APC, and they are relating with us. They are not happy with what is happening now. Tinubu and a few of the persons in government are playing the script.
But coming back to what you said earlier, you did mention that you anticipated this challenge coming more than eight months ago. But why did you fail to do the needful? Isn’t that a failure on your own part?
Are you talking about the state chairman?
Yes.
We knew things would happen, but we didn’t know that a government that preaches democracy can go overboard.
We made sure in the process that everything we did was clearly well done, followed due processes, constitution, everything. And that’s the best way you can go about it. But if the government decides to collapse all institutions of government, all agencies of government, because they don’t want an opposition party to exist, then that’s a different ball game, which we also have a solution to, but it’s not everything that we put on the table.
Since we have it, they know that whatever they’re doing will be futile, because, can they stop ADC? ADC has become a Nigerian project. You can’t stop Nigeria.
You know, one man can seize the politics of Lagos, put all the Lagos elites in his pocket, but you can’t do that with Nigeria. And that’s one thing these operatives working with Mr. President don’t know. You can’t do that with Nigeria. Nigeria is a lot more sophisticated.
You did mention that you’ve done all that is necessary to ensure that you follow due process within the party. Talk to me about what happened, because there is this allegation that legacy NWC members were promised certain positions at the point of transition to the David Mark leadership. Take, for instance, the man at the center of this controversy, Naifu Bala. He was then the Deputy National Chairman, North-East. And he magnanimously agreed to accept, according to his own side of the story, the National Vice Chairmanship of the party in North-East.
But that was not done. Instead, that position was ceded to Babachir. How true is this claim?
Thank you very much. I don’t want to say Bala was my friend. He’s still my good friend. When we were midwifing this process of the coalition, he worked very hard. But then, each time I look at some of them that say they don’t have any position, I say, me, who has been there since the formation? Who spent all my resources building this party? Which one do I have?
For you to lead by example, it’s not about what you have. We have to rescue the country. Most of the developed countries in the world, if it had been about politics, they wouldn’t have developed. But people who developed them, we have a missionary spirit.
They have the zeal of missionaries to work. When I started working with Bala, I was asking him to handle this, handle that, and so on. And he showed that kind of spirit. As a matter of fact, one or two of the times when people like Elrufai started Bala would say, come, let’s ask your man. Is there anything they want? Let’s give them. So he was working hard to see that ADC emerged the platform which a lot of us were doing.
But then, building the platform also needed a sacrifice. For instance, in the National Working Committee ADC had six members. Dr. Ibrahim Mani. He’s the National Treasurer. He’s, whether you call it Legacy ADC or Old ADC, he’s ADC. Dr. Ajadi, one of the Deputy National Chairmen, is Legacy ADC. We got about six, but they have the chairman. APC got about six. So it was fairly distributed but not everybody will get a position.
Was Nafiu Bala promised that particular position and the party reneged?
The issue now, as far as the public is concerned, it’s not the internal works within the ADC. It’s the misguided path that Amupitan, because I don’t want to say INEC. It is that man they put there as the National Chairman.
Amupitan is just a leader of INEC, for instance. There are commissioners and others who constitute the leadership.
Yes, but he’s the person who’s been speaking. They didn’t employ him to come and try to interpret the position of law. He’s an umpire. As an umpire, you must remain impartial. If there’s any judgement, you send it to your legal department.
But isn’t that what he did? Do you think he single-handedly did what happened without a consultation of the legal team of INEC?
We have information. We have data. We have letters.
Indicating what?
We have recommendations. He’s there saying, if you go to ADC and contest the election, if you come first, you will lose.
Is there anything in raising the question now?
It’s not in his place. He’s biased. Misguided.
Isn’t that harsh? He’s a professor of law.
He’s a professor and, of course, a very senior advocate of Nigeria. We are going to move that he’s derobed, because he has done everything that he shouldn’t have done in that profession. Whether it’s in the censorship, he will be de-robed as a SAN, he will be removed as a member of the NBA, because he has shown bias. We’re able to establish that.
Some would say there are allegations.
INEC is an umpire. He is not the interpreter of law. I mean, come, I have worked with over four INEC chairmen. When they have controversy, they invite the court, interpret this, let it be clear. You were brought in as INEC chairman, not to interpret court law. Even if you are a chairman, even if you are a lawyer, they brought you to show leadership of how to manage the processes for fairness.
But some would say, it’s the same situation. It was the same logic that is applied to other political parties. When there are court judgments or court rulings, INEC sits within with his legal team and all of that, and then look at the implications…
When there are court orders, in this case status quo ante bellum. What it means is clear. Even though it’s subject to different interpretations? It’s subject to. Now, all the processes that we conducted before the emergence of the David Mark NWC, INEC were there. INEC officers were there. They supervised the whole processes. And they know that by 29th of July, all the NWC members, including some of these state chairmen that they are parading sharing things.
Is there evidence that they are sharing anything?
All the state chairmen were there. State chairmen, 37 of them, because 36 states plus FCC, that’s 37. Then all the Zonal Chairmen. Zonal Chairmen, we had about seven. Seven, seven into four places. And so on. You add it. Then we had the NWC. We had 120 something men, NEC members. They all voted. it’s not between Chief Nwosu and Bala or any of these people.
The whole of NEC voted. And in that voting, you know what they did? They voted that the NWC, which I’m part of, Bala was part of, all of these people were part of, has been dissolved. They voted to dissolve it.
INEC sat there, took note. Then after dissolving it, the same NEC voted for David Mark and Co and the Aregbesola to become National Chairman, Secretary and the other positions.
But according to Nafiu, Chief Ralph Nwosu, the former National Chairman, was given a chance to speak. That is at the point of the transition now. And what happened was that he said, he was given a chance and he surprised everyone by announcing his resignation as National Chairman. He went ahead to say he didn’t give membership cards to Senator David Mark and Rauf Aregbesola and named them Acting Chairman and National Secretary. Perhaps he’s referring to the action as single-handedly now.
But you are saying that the NEC, collectively voted, you know, to approve that decision. How does it work?
We have NWC. NWC will meet. And then the people who wanted to come to the party met with us. And to show them that the NWC have confirmed all a few members of the committee have been talking to them about. That’s how it was organised. But, to authenticate it, we held the NEC on the 29th. Ratification, as it is called, isn’t it? This event happened on the 2nd or 3rd of July. But 21 days later, we held NEC. All the state chairmen were there. Everybody was there. And we voted on it.
What we did on the 2nd or so of July was a political show to show the world that we are almost resolving. And all the attendees in the NEC were recorded by INEC. All of their names were there. Everybody signed. At least 99%. Assuming that one or two persons somehow were not there.
Was Nafiu himself there?
Nafiu was there. Quorum was formed for any, whether it’s the AGM of a company, or party, or even local meeting. Once you form a quorum, it’s binding. You’re good to go. And so on. And the disturbing thing is that all these records are with INEC. So they cannot be saying status quo antebellum. The process was concluded July 29th. Somebody went to court September. As at that time, no hostilities. So the case was instituted after. Two months after.
After the emergence of the leadership.
Yes.
So meaning status quo, in your own opinion, is the current leadership.
It’s clear now. INEC issued us the certificate, the CTC of that NEC that put David Mark, Aregbesola, and others in place. Okay.
Nafiu, in his submission, said that you contravene certain sections of your constitution. He was making reference to section 8, subsection 2, and section 9, subsection 4 of your constitution, your party’s constitution, 2022, as amended. How true is this allegation?
We held more than five to seven NEC meetings. The very first NEC meeting we held was held at the Nicon Luxury. And when we held that meeting first of all, the whole NEC were there, and we said, people are meeting us for us to try to build a coalition. Do we accept we want to build a coalition, or merger.
We all voted, and we empowered the committee to follow up with that. That’s the first meeting we had. When we followed up with that, the people that we, we are meeting with, they saw our constitution, and pointed out a few things, maybe including this one.
And they said, come on, in your constitution, if you are not up to two years, you cannot contest this, you cannot do this, we said, okay, no problem. In our constitution also, we have there that.
Was there a waiver?
Yeah, we can have a waiver, but we didn’t want to go waiver side. We have a provision there that NEC can play the role of national convention. So that if we call the NEC together, and they look at any provision, they may decide to, they may decide to step it down, or to amend it.
You mean NEC can override the position of national convention?
NEC can play the role of national convention. NEC can play the role.
In what section specifically?
I’m not a lawyer. I cannot recall immediately. It’s there, but it’s there. Google it, you’ll see.
Okay. Now, NEC can play the role. This thing that I NEC, we are part of it. If we are breaching anything, NEC will point it out to us. And so NEC can meet, and say, this, we may need to waive it. We all agreed.
Note, one thing that we agreed, we wanted to form, we want to be a bigger party. Instead of, every four years, we come and run an election. One day your party will get deregistered. You don’t win. You’re begging people to go and contest. Why don’t we build a party that has capacity to go into government? And we all agreed.
But why is Nafiu raising this concern?
Nafiu was part of the voting, we have the forensics. However, however, I don’t know if that was what happened with, with Nafiu, but all that is happening, if the government in place, if the government in place can decapitate PDP with whatever, resources, this is a special budget.
If the government in place can collapse governments of states that have billions of budget. If they can get the whole government of Delta State to say we are no longer PDP, we are APC. They can get the whole government of River State to do the same thing. And so, , it takes the grace of God for them not to be able to collapse some individuals. And they are not able to collapse somebody like, like me.