- APC’s Basiru says ADC’s new members are frustrated politicians who lack relevance in their original political parties.
- He insisted talk of coalition in a presidential system is ignorant and meant to deceive Nigerians.
The national secretary of the All Progressives Congress, Dr Ajibola Basiru, has described politicians moving to the African Democratic Congress as frustrated and internally displaced.
Basiru, who spoke to journalists in Osogbo, Osun State, on Sunday, said such individuals lacked political relevance in their former parties.
He said some of them were using terms inappropriate for a presidential system of government due to desperation.
According to him, there is no such thing as a coalition in a presidential democracy.
He said, “Nigerians need to be properly educated; there is nothing like a coalition. People who are talking about a coalition appear either to want to confuse Nigerians or they are ignorant of what a coalition is about.”
“A coalition is a temporary alliance for the purpose of forming a government, and it is more apposite in the context of a parliamentary system of government when none of the parties that contested could form a majority in the parliament, so two or more parties will form a coalition to have a majority,” he added.
Basiru said using the term in a presidential democracy was misleading and aimed at creating false importance.
“It was appropriate to say that certain individuals have become frustrated in their present political party and have started to defect to the ADC, and for the character that said the APC is in panic mode, I don’t know what parameters they are using to judge panic mode,” he said.
He accused the defectors of inconsistency, recalling that they recently claimed Nigeria was becoming a one-party state.
“As far as I’m concerned, they are just aligning some people to form them. I’m a party administrator, and I know what it is to say that you want to join a party and take over the leadership of a party,” he said.
Basiru said there had been no official change in the ADC’s leadership, according to the records of the Independent National Electoral Commission.
He said, “As of today, you may go to the website of INEC; nothing has changed in terms of the leadership structure of the ADC, notwithstanding the jamboree that they are talking about. There are procedures in the culture of any party as to how people assume leadership.”
Basiru faulted claims by the defectors to positions such as pro tem chairmen or national secretaries, saying such titles only applied to parties in formation.
He said, “The desperation of these individuals also did not allow them to advance the fact that even some of the nomenclature they are using is inappropriate. You cannot say you are a pro tem chairman or national secretary of a political party that is already in existence. It’s either you are a substantive chairman or you are an acting chairman. The term pro tem is used when a political party is still in formation. The ADC has been a registered party.”
“So, if you are becoming an acting chairman or acting secretary, what is the procedure by which you have emerged? When you have an assemblage of people who are not even members of that political party, to say that you have assumed leadership, I think it’s more of a circus show,” he added.
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