2023 elections: Adamu refused to support Tinubu, APC candidates financially — Lukman alleges

The leadership crisis in the ruling All Progressives Congress APC assumed a new twist on Wednesday, following revelations by its National Vice Chairman, Northwest, Salihu Moh. Lukman that the National Chairman, Senator Abdullahi Adamu wilfully refused to extend financial support to President Bola Tinubu and all candidates of the party in the lead-up to the 2023 General Elections.

At a news conference in Abuja, Lukman who has been vociferous in asking Adamu to render a financial account of the party, noted that the party made over N30 billion from the sale of forms, yet it never supported any of its candidates.

Lukman was reacting to two separate television interviews granted by Adamu and the National Secretary of the party, Senator Iyiola Omisore in which the duo accused him of being a nonentity and black sheep in the party.

He said; “We are expected to present a proposed national budget to the National Executive Committee NEC for approval by the provisions of Article 13(3A)(14) of the APC constitution. I felt embarrassed when I heard the National Secretary (Omisore) say the budget of the party has been sent to the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC. INEC is not the approving authority of the budget of the APC. The approving authority is the NEC. Till today we don’t have a national budget. Yet we made over N30 billion from sales of forms. Till today as a member of the NWC and majority members of the NWC, maybe with the exception of the Financial Secretary, Treasurer and or the Auditor who may have inside knowledge of how much was expended on the renovation of the National Secretariat of the party, we have no knowledge of what is being expended.

“Talking of national budget, we are just coming out of elections whereby we were not able to sustain past precedence. What was the past precedence? Under Comrade Adams Oshiomhole in 2019, every candidate of the party received something from the National Secretariat. In this last election, no candidate of the party received a dime from the party. Talking of finances, in our constitution the NEC is supposed to approve some form of sharing formula. I am aware that each state chapter has received about N20 million out of the N30 billion. Put together, that is about N700 million less than a billion which is less than 3 percent of the total income that has been earned. Yet we want to sweep this under the carpet. We are having states, zonal, local councils and ward levels who are left on their own. The whole question of funding of the party has not been addressed”.

Asked whether any such support was extended to then-Candidate Tinubu, Lukman said; “He (Tinubu) didn’t get a dime from the party. I am making this public. Let them challenge me and contradict me”.

He said when General Muhammadu Buhari was the party’s standard bearer in 2015 and 2019, he got some level of support from the party.

“Look, in 2015, the party was truly a model party. President Buhari didn’t have money. People were assigned responsibilities to raise money. It is just like Asiwaju and you say Asiwaju has money. So there were people assigned with the responsibility of mobilizing money for the party. If anything was done in 2023 based on that, it would be the initiative of Asiwaju. I am not aware of it as a party. If you remember in between, we were busy causing distractions about what should be our roles in the Presidential Campaign Council. Unless if we are humble and honest to admit that these are things that ordinarily shouldn’t have happened and admit we need to correct them and reshape the relationship between us and the government that emerged, we would continue to have the problems we are having”, he stated.

Resentment against NASS Leadership

Lukman also explained how Adamu refused to obey the party’s decision on the choice of the leadership of the National Assembly, saying the National Chairman kept distancing himself from the position of the party.

He said rather than developing guidelines as directed by the provisions of Article 13 (4.6) of the constitution that would guide the emergence of the leadership of the National Assembly, the Adamu-led NWC approached it with a blank cheque.

“No guidelines, nothing. And as a result if not for the intervention of the president we would have walked into a disaster. I appealed to our leaders to see the country beyond our personal desires. As a party, we ran our campaigns based on the Muslim-Muslim ticket and I would be the first to rationalize that because the choices were very hard choices for the party and for our presidential candidate. It was purely an electoral strategy. If we did that and want to support Asiwaju to run a government that all Nigerians would have a sense of belonging, what were we supposed to do? It was to take steps and amend it by ensuring that the diversity of the country was recognized in the emergence of the leadership of the National Assembly and other arms of government.

“What did we see? Our National Chairman, even after the party took a decision, was now mobilizing resentment against the decision of our party. He never campaigned for the party’s adopted candidates. He was busy saying the party advised that more consultations should be made. Look at the disaster when the Governors of the party met with him. Even yesterday he confirmed on Arise that the leadership of the party met with him. Now assuming even if it is true they did not consult you, as a leader what stopped him from calling Senator Akpabio and Hon Abass to raise some of these issues and even query them if he was not satisfied with their explanations he could go and meet Asiwaju?”, He asked.

Fatal failure

Describing Omisore as a phenomenal failure, Lukman challenged the National Secretary to be humble in accepting the defeat of the party in his Osun state.

“Osun was a disaster and that is where the National Secretary comes from. I saw him yesterday shamelessly talking about a winning team. If we are a winning team, why prevent us from replicating the feat in your base? We did not only lose the governorship seat, but we also lost all the Senate seats, House of Representatives seats, and House of Assembly seats. Osun is the only state we have that case. It is only the National Secretary that is in denial of that reality. The first mark of a progressive is to have the humility to accept your shortcomings. I saw a National Secretary talking brazenly as if he was a champion”, he stated.

Omisore had in the television interviews said Lukman was acting alone in the 25-member NWC.

“There are cowards everywhere. So it is not impossible. But the point is that out of 25 members of the NWC, only one person is the ‘black sheep.’

“He is just used to doing the rantings. There is nothing special about it”, he had stated.