Rivers APC petitions Ganduje, to overturn National Working Committee’s decision to disband executive branch
Emeka Beke, the embattled chairman of the All Progressives Congress in Rivers State, has appealed to Abdullahi Ganduje, the party’s national chairman, to overturn the National Working Committee’s decision to dissolve the party’s executive branch in the state.
Beke stated that the party’s executive in the state still has time left to serve during his speech on Thursday in Port Harcourt.
Remember that the Ganduje-led APC NWC declared in Abuja on Wednesday that the Rivers excos would be dissolved and that a caretaker committee would take over to manage the party’s operations in the state for a period of six months.
Chief Tony Okocha, the caretaker committee’s chairman, is a well-known associate of former Peoples Democratic Party governor Nyesom Wike, who is currently in a national coalition with the APC.
President Bola Tinubu ignored APC loyalists, such as Tonye Cole, the party’s governorship candidate in the general elections of 2023, and instead appointed Wike of the PDP to the position of minister for Rivers.
Cole is an ally of former Rivers State governor Rotimi Amaechi, Wike’s worst political adversary.
“We have resolved at the NWC meeting that Rivers APC should be dissolved and a caretaker committee put in place,” said Felix Mouka, the party’s national publicity secretary, while announcing the dissolution of the Rivers APC excos on Wednesday in Abuja. Eric Nwibani will serve as secretary and Chief Tony Okocha as chairman of the committee.
“This here at the party secretariat is where the committee members will be inaugurated on Friday.”
However, in response to the national leadership of the party’s decision on Thursday, Emeka, the chairman of the Rivers APC who was fired, argued that, as per the party constitution, only the NEC has the authority to dissolve an elected state exco.
“What does the party’s constitution say?” he asked. It is the moral right of NEC alone. I’m shocked that the NWC claimed to have such authority. I don’t believe the NEC ever granted the NWC the authority to act in that way. It is incredibly unexpected and shocking.
He compared Ganduje to a man who lives in a glass home and cautioned him to proceed with caution.
“Ganduje is aware of how he got to be this party’s national chairman. You should not throw stones at this man since he is a man living in a glass house. He needs to turn around.
In response to accusations that the APC’s move gave Wike control over the state’s political hierarchy, Beke stated that the Federal Capital Territory’s current Minister is not an APC member.
“Well, I don’t know because he is not a member of our party,” he said. It is not in Rivers State that Wike is an APC member. He is not a national level member of the APC.
“However, if the national has made that decision, they ought to be able to handle the consequences.”
The APC’s state publicity secretary, Darlington Nwauju, also made a statement in which he argued that the NWC lacked the authority to dissolve an elected executive and called the move extra-constitutional.
“The purported dissolution of the state executives of the APC in Rivers State is extra-constitutional and falls flat in the face of sound crisis management and peacebuilding,” Nwauju said in the statement provided to our correspondent.
“The NWC cannot adopt such drastic steps as dissolving the party’s validly elected executives or waiving the requirements for any individual to hold positions for which they are not constitutionally qualified without the NEC’s permission.
“All progressive-minded people in Rivers State cannot afford to leave our party in the hands of political undertakers.”
