Tinubu, Atiku absent as APC govs meet party NWC

The gulf in the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) seems to be growing wider as some prominent members of the party on Wednesday stayed away from a meeting between the party’s governor’s and members of the National Working Committee (NWC)

Those who were absent included party leaders like Senator Bola Tinubu and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.

Also absent at the meeting were governors of Lagos, Osun, Edo and Adamawa states.

Speaking with newsmen after the meeting, which lasted several hours, Kaduna State Governor Nasir el-Rufai reinstated their support for President Muhammadu Buhari against the back drop of concerns over the president’s health.

While they said that at 74 Buhari could have one ailment or the order, the governors however said that there was no cause for alarm over Buhari’s health issues and called on Nigerians to continue to pray for him to get better.

Reacting to news that the president agains failed to show up for the weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting, he said, “We are not worried about the development, it is not compulsory for the president to preside over every Federal Executive Council (FEC), that is why our constitution makes available the place of the Vice President.

“Mr President is 74 years old; at that age, it is possible to have one ailment or the other, even I, at 57 take medication for one ailment or the other. Our prayer is that the president gets better but the reason he has a Vice President is because of a time like this, it may not be as a result of sickness that he did not attend FEC, he may have had other pressing issues to attend to. I have not had to chair every State Executive Council in Kaduna state because the deputy governor is there, if I have other issues of greater priority to attend to.

“We are not worried yet or have any reason to be worried but I call on every Nigerian to join all of us to pray for the improved health of the President. It has improved in the last few weeks since he came back and we will continue to pray for his improved health.”

El-Rufai also talked about some of the issues raised during the meeting with the APC’s NWC, revealing that most important decision was that “henceforth we will hold a meeting here at the national secretariat once every month.”

According to him the reason for that was to increase interaction, foster relation between the national and state branches of the party as well as work towards strengthening the party.

“We also took certain resolutions and the first is that the Progressive Governors have committed to work assiduously at strengthening and rebuilding the party and ensuring reconciliation and unification of the party at all levels.

“We have committed to providing the NWC all the support that they need. We will also engage in fund raising from our donors, sympathizers of the APC to ensure that the national headquarters of the party and indeed all organs of the party have the wherewithal to continue with the difficult work they have been doing within the party.”

“The joint meeting between the NWC and the governors also resolved that at our next meeting, we are going to look at the arrangements for the midterm convention and put in place the resources necessary to ensure that the convention hold as required by our party.

“The governors restate their loyalty to Mr President, the Vice President and all leaders of our party; we enjoin Nigerians to continue to pray for the improved health of the President,” he said.

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