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| Bola Tinubu is APC’s National Leader, and Presidential candidate for the 2023 presidential election. |
The internal crisis within the All Progressives Congress, (APC), and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), can only mean good news for Labour party's Peter Obi who has been gaining more and more grounds ahead of next year's presidential election.
The country's main opposition party, PDP, has been struggling to reconcile aggrieved members since the conclusion of its heavily monetized primary election where Atiku Abubakar emerged victorious.
Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, who came second in the PDP presidential primary, and who is at the heart of the crisis, recently declared he'll work against the PDP in the next election after his demand that the party's National Chairman, Iyorchia Ayu, resigns and his position be zoned to the South, was rejected.
“Doctor Ayu said we are children. Yes, the children brought you from the gutter to make you Chairman. Now we have seen that you don’t want the party to win election, we will help you," Wike said in response to Ayu's refusal to resign, and calling those demanding his resignation 'children'.
Wike's response is an indication that the PDP will likely head into next year's election in more than one piece.
But the situation in the ruling party, APC, is not any better.
The APC’s similarly heavily monetized primary has also left the party fractured. The situation got even more complicated with the choice of former Governor of Borno State, Kashim Shettima, as Tinubu's running mate, meaning the APC will be fielding an all Muslim ticket in the next presidential election.
While a lot of effort has been made by the APC to convince the public, particularly the Christian community, that the decision to field same faith ticket is in the best interest of the country, moves to reconcile aggrieved members who lost to Tinubu in the primary, however, has been unsuccessful.
The most recent attempt by the APC to mend fences among Tinubu, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Senate President Ahmad Lawan, Amaechi and others who contested the presidential primary in June this year, also didn't end well.
The APC had organized a peace meeting in Abuja in hope to reconcile aggrieved members including Senate president, Ahmed Lawan; former Transport minister and other notable presidential aspirants in the party’s presidential primary.
However, according to The Leadership, the so called peace meeting failed to hold as scheduled, as those invited failed to show up.
But a statement issued by one of the aspirants and convener of the peace meeting, Dr Felix, claimed the meeting was postponed without given reason for the postponement.
“Please be informed that the strategic meeting of 2023 Presidential Aspirants of the All Progressives Congress (APC), scheduled to hold on Wednesday the 31st of August has been postponed. A new date for the meeting will be communicated soon. Apologies for any inconvenience(s) that this might cause,” he stated.
A source close to one of the presidential aspirants, however, told journalists that most of the key presidential aspirants invited for the meeting did not show interest, adding that a particular aspirant from the North did not even acknowledge the invitation letter sent to him.
The source, a party chieftain who did not want his name in print, said, “It seems some of these aspirants are yet to come to terms with our presidential candidate because some of them are not seen to be rallying the needed support for the party yet.
“All of them are well informed about this meeting. The organisers even issued a statement twice to remind them but some did not show interest at all. I can tell you that only nine of them were ready to attend. These nine aspirants are among the heavyweights we expected to show up”.