Suspend Ganduje, APC NWC now, Onjeh Urges Tinubu, NEC

Comrade Daniel Onjeh, APC Candidate for the Benue South Senatorial District in the 2023 General Elections, has called on President Bola Tinubu and the APC NEC to suspend the members of the party’s NWC and direct the National Chairman, Dr Abdullahi Ganduje, to honourably resign.

Comrade Onjeh, a former Chairman of the Governing Board of the Projects Development Institute (PRODA), Enugu, made this call in a letter submitted to the APC NEC through the party’s National Secretary on Thursday.

Earlier last month, Onjeh issued a seven-day ultimatum to the APC National Chairman and the NWC, to either treat his petition of anti-party activities leveled against the suspended chairman of the APC in Benue State, Mr. Augustine Agada, or resign. He argued that the national leadership of the APC and the NWC both lacked the moral rectitude to issue directives to any member of the party, when they themselves were not upholding the spirit and letters of the party’s constitution.

Onjeh equally reminded the party of the letter he submitted to the NWC through the National Chairman, titled, ‘Benue APC Crisis; the NWC’s Circumvention and Total Disregard for the APC Constitution’, in which he copied the APC NEC, and reminded the NWC of the petition he submitted to it on January 22, 2024, titled, ‘Petition Against Anti-Party Activities by The Benue State APC Chairman and Others, Targeted at My Candidature’.

In the reminder, Onjeh implored the NWC to, within seven days, constitute a fact-finding committee that would look into his petition, make recommendations, and subsequently constitute a disciplinary committee. Furthermore, he stated that failure to do so would leave him and the progressive members of the APC Benue State Chapter with no other choice but to seek redress in court, even as they exercise their constitutionally guaranteed right to protest and picket the APC National Secretariat until it meets their demands. He further stated, “We also notified the NWC that we intended to press for the resignation of the party’s National Chairman, Dr Abdullahi Ganduje, because he has no business holding that esteemed position.”

Following his reminder, stated Onjeh, on March 27, 2024 , the party’s National Secretariat, through Mr Muazu Mohammed Bawa, invited him for a meeting with the Deputy National Secretary, the National Legal Adviser, and the Vice Chairman (North Central) at 12 noon the following day. At the meeting, he was assured that the NWC would look into his petition and do the needful in pursuance of its constitutional mandate. “But almost three weeks later, the NWC has not lived up to its commitment to do justice to my petition and bring a definitive closure to the vexing issue of anti-party activities perpetrated by the suspended chairman of the Benue State APC Chapter, one Mr Augustine Agada,” lamented Comrade Onjeh.

To buttress his argument, Comrade Onjeh added, “Aside from initiating and driving government policy, the governing boards of MDAs have three cardinal functions, namely: to conduct promotional exercises, to supervise recruitment exercises, and to carryout disciplinary action. Any board, which fails in the discharge of these cardinal roles is not fit to oversee an agency. In a similar vein, aside from members of the NWC carrying out the day-to-day functions of the APC, they have cardinal roles to play as well, including disciplinary action.”

The former President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), opined that one of the most grievous offences against the party as mentioned in the APC Constitution is anti-party activity. This offence, he stressed, is heinous in the sense that it negates the fundamental principle of setting up a political party, which is to win elections or capture power. “Any act that sabotages this goal is indeed an odious perfidy,” stated Onjeh.

Onjeh further noted that in failing to take action on his petition, which in essence sought redress for grievous anti-party activities perpetrated by Mr Augustine Agada against him and the party in Benue State, the NWC had circumvented the party constitution, which stands on a tripod of justice, fairness, and equity. “This dereliction of duty, lends credence to rumours in some quarters that some people in high places enticed members of the NWC with promises of plum federal appointments in exchange for the subversion of the course of justice and the jettisoning of my petition without a consideration of its merit,” alleged Onjeh.

Further to that, Comrade Onjeh emphasized that the NWC’s shoddy handling of his petition and its disregard for the far-reaching consequences of its inaction, especially on the stability of the party and its members in Benue State, was emblematic of the ineptitude of Dr Abdullahi Ganduje-led party administration. He stated, “The current National Chairman has exhibited gross ineptitude that disqualifies him from heading the party’s NWC. If the head is rotten, the saying goes, the body is dead. By the same token, members of the NWC have woefully failed to discharge their constitutional responsibilities to the party and its members nationwide.”

Comrade Onjeh asserted that in the interest of the party, the NEC should step in and check the rot in the party by suspending all the members of the NWC, and constituting a caretaker committee that would work assiduously to rebuild the confidence of party members and sustain it until the convocation of the next national congress. By taking this bold step, he stated, the NEC would be upholding the integrity of the party and salvaging its good name.

“The current situation surrounding the sordid affairs of Dr Abdullahi Ganduje necessitates the NEC’s intervention to direct him to honourably resign in the interest of the party. His resignation will rescue the already battered integrity and corporate image of the party,” stated Onjeh. He added that the facts he presented to the NWC in his petition and subsequent reminders he referenced in the letter, were some of the compelling justifications that warrant Ganduje’s immediate resignation. NEC’s intervention to facilitate this, according to Onjeh, will strengthen the confidence of party members across the nation and boost the party’s image. He also observed that due to the importance of this issue, the NEC should not dilly-dally, as delay will aggravate the party’s floundering image.

In Onjeh’s view, Ganduje’s corruption cases and party maladministration were incurring the party serious bad press.

“Political parties are the wheels and building blocks of democracy. Voters make decisions based on their evaluation of the strength of political parties’ manifestos. Any political party that does not exhibit a modicum of integrity cannot keep to its promises. Currently, the APC is in the eye of the storm, thanks to Ganduje’s widely publicized prosecution on corruption charges and maladministration when he was the governor of Kano State. Psychologically, this will impact the way the electorates view the APC,” opined Comrade Onjeh. He added that the citizens’ perception of the party at the helm of a nation’s affairs determines their loyalty, commitment to nation-building, and belief in the political process. He declared that no democracy grows without the participation of its citizens. “We must cauterize anything that makes them lose interest in governance,” stated Onjeh.

Onjeh further noted that people care about integrity, hence, he believes the legal circus around the National Chairman is injurious to the party’s corporate image. “It will disincentivize party loyalty and downplay President Bola Tinubu’s achievements. In the current difficult economic climate, integrity is necessary to sustain the hopes of the masses. Their hope is sustained when they know their leaders are adhering strictly to due process and the rule of law,” stated Onjeh.

Comrade Onjeh argued that since the NWC has woefully failed in the discharge of its constitutional duty, after the NEC suspends it and take over its function, it should immediately constitute a committee to attend to the petition he submitted to the NWC, and investigate the anti-party activities Mr Austin Agada, the suspended chairman of APC Benue State Chapter, perpetrated against him and the party. “Serving the right punitive measures against the suspended chairman will serve as a deterrent to would-be offenders,” stated Onjeh. He added that failure to do so will send the wrong signal to the entire members of the APC in Benue State, as going forward, none of them will see anti-party activity as a grievous offence against the party. Rules, he asserted, are meant to be kept. “If we cannot abide by the rule at the party level, we cannot keep nor enforce laws in our country,” he said.

Comrade Onjeh warned that selecting to whom party laws were applied (as the NWC did to his petition) is indicative of a predilection to select to whom in society justice should be dispensed. The actions of a ruling party and its administration, he noted, were intertwined and inseparable because they both pursue the same manifesto.

In conclusion, Onjeh stated that in a constitutional democracy, the President is a direct image of his political party, as they both project the same manifesto. This manifesto, in Onjeh’s view, must be driven by integrity to ensure its acceptability and citizen participation in governance. He implored President Tinubu, the leader of the party, to take the bold step of backing his call for the NEC to suspend members of the NWC and to direct the party’s National Chairman, Dr Ganduje, to honourably resign forthwith. Onjeh added that doing so will forestall the rapid downplaying of the current administration’s laudable achievements thus far by the ineptitude and lack of integrity of the NWC and Dr Abdullahi Ganduje.