“I have therefore gone back to the trenches and will try to work with all committed Nigerians who agree and subscribe to the goal of actively campaigning for the survival and development of democracy in Nigeria.”

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A former member of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Malam Salihu Lukman, has resigned from the governing party.

His disengagement from the party was contained in a statement he issued in Abuja on Wednesday, June 12, titled: “APC and The Future of Nigerian Democracy: Letter to Selected APC Leaders.”

The former national vice chairman (North West) hinged his decision on the lack of internal democracy and inability of the leadership of the party to allow the much needed reforms within the party.

The former Director General of the Progressive Governors’ Forum (PGF) in the statement however failed to disclose his next destination but said he has gone back to trenches with other political leaders ahead of the 2027 general elections.

He said: “Given all this, it is possible to remain in APC if at all President Tinubu will allow internal reform in the party to return it to its founding vision, which as it is, is very remote. But my reality now in the party is that my membership has been rendered useless and there is no need for me to continue to impose myself.

“I have therefore gone back to the trenches and will try to work with all committed Nigerians who agree and subscribe to the goal of actively campaigning for the survival and development of democracy in Nigeria.

“I am confident that a strong democracy with functional political parties is possible in Nigeria. I am also confident that in our lifetime we can produce governments that are truly capable of making the lives of Nigerians better. I don’t expect party leaders will agree with my decision. I believe that eventually, we will be united will all party leaders and other Nigerians who are committed to developing Nigerian democracy.”

-THE NATION

Dr Salihu Lukman, the Director-General, Progressive Governors Forum (PGF), has identified All Progressives Congress leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, as one of the few people who have demonstrated understanding of his having to quit.

Lukman confirmed his resignation from the position, saying it was in the best interest of the APC.
In a statement on Wednesday, he said that he resigned to enable him continue his campaign to return the APC to its founding vision adding that his sudden resignation will not affect the campaign.

“My decision to resign my position is to enable me continue with the campaign to return APC to its founding vision, which is to build a party that is not only democratic, but oriented based on social democratic principles.

“Since the news filtered out on Monday, Jan. 17, about my resignation as Director-General of PGF, many party leaders, friends, family members and well wishers have reached out to me with words of support and encouragement.

“Many people, especially journalists wanted confirmation. I can confirm that it is true; I have given my resignation to forum chairman, Gov. Atiku Bagudu.

“I restrained myself from making any public statement on the matter because I am still awaiting acceptance,” he said.

Lukman said he had however privately confirmed his resignation to party leaders, friends and family members who called him to enquire.

He noted that since the buildup to 2019 general elections, internal contest in the APC began to degenerate as some of its leaders became intolerant.

He said every campaign to get the party’s leadership to commence the process of internal reform was resisted.

This, he said, was especially as some party leaders in the bid to emerge as its candidates for offices, became hostile while party campaigns drifted to almost war situations in many instances.

“Organs of the party stopped meetings as required by the Constitution, views of party leaders became decisions of the party.

“Thank God, we have a leader in President Muhammadu Buhari who disagreed with what is going on in the party and support the campaign for reform.

“Without going into all the details, the inspiration to setup the current Caretaker and Extra-ordinary Convention Planning Committee (CECPC) came from Buhari based on the expectation of ensuring that the drift in the party is arrested.

“This is expected to produce a new leadership, which should emerge at the party’s National Convention,” Lukman said.

He added that once the CECPC began to show signs of reluctance to organise the convention, it should be a source of concern to all party members desirous of reform.

He said following the news of his resignation, many of the party’s leaders and members, including Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu called to express worries.

“One of the party leaders who honoured me with an invitation to meet him late on Tuesday, Jan. 17, was Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.

“He commended me for championing the campaigns to reform the party and expressed shock that some members of forum were intolerant to criticism.

“He encouraged me to continue with my campaign, which is what the party need,” Lukman said.

He added that while it was good that the party’s CECPC had announced Feb.26 as date for the convention, party leaders should ensure that those who emerged from the exercise were tolerant to criticism.

“The next task before all party leaders is to ensure the new leadership of the party to emerge from the National Convention will be tolerant to criticism, democratic and more importantly share the commitments of the founding leaders to build a truly progressive party,” he said.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the PGF is an umbrella body of serving governors elected on the platform of the APC.

Dr Salihu Lukman, Director-General, Progressive Governors Forum (PGF), has described the call for the postponement of the All Progressives Congress (APC) National Convention by some persons from February to a later date as illogical.

Lukman said this in a letter to APC leaders on Monday in Abuja while reacting to the development.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Sen. Orji Uzor Kalu had on Dec. 13, 2021, written a letter to the Chairman, APC Caretaker and Extra-ordinary Convention Planning (CECPC) Gov. Mai Mala Buni, calling for the postponement of the convention.

Lukman, however, warned that postponing the APC national convention could led to a repeat of 2019 Zamfara experience if the needful was not done.

He said the APC CECPC should make a formal announcement about the date and venue for the convention to disassociate itself from such calls.

He said such announcement is critical to prove that the committee is not interested in postponing the convention from the agreed February 2022 date as approved by President Muhammadu Buhari.

“Statutorily, by the requirement of the Electoral Act, the party is expected to serve at least 21 days notice of the convention to the Independent National Electoral Commision (INEC).

“This basically means that if the convention is to hold any day before February 28, 2021, the notice to INEC should be given on or before February 7, 2022.

“That being the case, the temptation could be to argue that there is more time, some reminders would be necessary at this point,” Lukman said.

He noted that Buni had done an excellent job since he emerged as chairman of the CECPC in June 2020 by ensuring peace within the party and should not allow his good works to be destroyed by postponing the convention.

He called on APC leaders to wake up to their responsibility of providing the needed political leadership to the country.

“No one should imagine that agendas set in 2014 or 2019 are sufficient to respond to contemporary challenges, which post 2023 governance will be expected to respond to.

“If anything, it may also be important to emphasis the fact that to respond to contemporary challenges facing the country would require massive investment in human capital development.

“This will call for a deliberate and aggressive policy to mobilise large-scale public investment to rebuild public schools at all levels.

“The correlation between collapse of education since the mid 1980s, rising levels of unemployment and insecurity are very glaring,” he said.

Lukman said APC must come up with practically convincing answers, which should form the basis of public support by Nigerians to guarantee its victory in the 2023 elections.

He said the inability to discharge responsibility or avoid it by towing the path of a deceptive campaign for postponement of the party’s national convention could only spell doom for it.

He added that this could also return Nigeria to the hands of those who laid the foundation for all the challenges currently facing the country.

Lukman appealed to the APC CECPC to ensure that the February 2022 convention is not just about electing National Working Committee (NWC) members for the party.

“There must be some reflections about the challenges facing the country, with priority focus on problems of insecurity, rebuilding public education and health through mobilisation of massive financial investment in these sectors,” he said.

Mr Salihu Lukman, the Director-General, Progressive Governors’ Forum (PGF), says that in spite of the current crisis rocking the All Progressive Congress (APC), there is no division among the governors.

Lukman, in a statement in Abuja on Monday, dismissed a report, which claimed the crisis had divided the governors, as false.

According to him, there is nothing like the kind of sensational division being alluded to among the progressive governors.

PGF director-general said the report which read: “13 governors back NWC, seven oppose to it as baseless”.

According to him, progressive governors are individually and collectively committed to the development of the party.

“In the context of the current challenges facing the party leadership, progressive governors are all working for the quick resolutions of the crisis.

“Although approaches and perspectives of each progressive governor may vary, they have been able to debate and reach some consensus on the problems affecting the party as contained in the resolutions of the emergency teleconference meeting of June 13, 2020,” he said.

Lukman said that part of the resolutions, which was made public, included working collectively to ensure the strengthening of the internal mechanism for the selection of party candidates in all elections.

“Strengthening fair and democratic internal party mechanism means that the party will recognise and respect individual position of every leader and member.

“Debates and contestation of positions will be encouraged in the party.

“Anyone who seeks to stifle internal debate within the party is only interested in destroying the vital progressive credential, which the party must resist,” he said.

He said those peddling falsehood among the governors were doing everything possible to impose their fantasies, which was unfortunate.

According to him, the reality is that all Progressive Governors are guided by all the resolutions adopted at the June 13, 2020 meeting, adding that those trying to create imaginary divisions were enemies of the party.