Tinubu moves to save merger parties

DETERMINED to ensure that the formation of the All Progressives Congress (APC), which was agreed last week by the four merging political parties is successful, the national leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Bola Tinubu, Monday met with the leadership of the Rufai Hanga-led faction of the Congress for Progressives Change (CPC) towards resolving the lingering crisis in the party.

Meanwhile, the National Vice Chairman of the Alliance for Democracy (AD) in the North-West Zone, Alhaji Abdallah Ibrahim, has described the APC creation to dislodge the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2015 general elections as a dead on arrival effort and an exercise in futility that would not augur well for all the parties involved.

Tinubu’s meeting with the CPC’s faction, The Guardian gathered, was at the instance of the ACN’s leader, who met with his CPC counterpart, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, to seek his permission after receiving a letter from the Rufai Hanga-led group, which notified the merging team of the party’s pending court case, as well as being the authentic faction in possession of the CPC certificate of registration.

The merger committees of both ACN and ANPP, it was also gathered, insisted that the meeting was necessary after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) hinted that it would not permit the registration of the APC if any of the merging parties fails to relinquish its certificate of registration to the commission.

Tinubu, who met with the CPC’s faction for about four hours at the Arewa Suites in Abuja, promised the leaders of the determination of the merger to accommodate their group, urging them not to only withdraw their case against both Buhari and the Tony Momoh-led national leadership of the CPC, but release the CPC certificate of registration, which is under their custody so as not to derail the process of registering the newly formed APC by INEC.

Speaking at the end of the meeting, Tinubu said he had fruitful deliberation with the group, adding that the essence of leadership in a political party is to carry everybody along.

“The meeting was a very good one, sweet. We met in the interest of our various objectives. To me, I am working in the interest of Nigeria and APC. I am a committed individual; we are in a committed group, surrounded by people of vision and great commitment. It will succeed; our rivals do everything to scuttle us. But as committed people, we are ready to make sacrifices. Leadership is about carrying people along and resolving conflicts with the right people that are motivated to do those things that are necessary for the progress of a nation. These are the things that we have achieved here today at this meeting,” Tinubu stated.

Leader of the factional CPC group, Rufai Hanga, who described the meeting as the beginning of peace in the CPC, noted that his group would be part of the merger and the newly formed APC.

The AD leader made the observation at a press conference recently in Kano. He further observed that when people talk of merger, it simply means the parties involved were not tight to their principles. He queried that when ACN, ANPP and CPC merged what would be the fate of their party ideologies and principles.

According to him, what the North is looking for is not merger, but a true Nigerian leader that would take the region to the promised land “not minding from the political party or ethnic group such a leader comes from.” He said the smaller parties would field candidates with merger or no merger.