Tinubu accuses Oyegun of sabotage, heightening fears of deeper crisis in APC

The crisis bedeviling the All Progressives Congress (APC) may explode, following a letter written by a national leader of the party, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu to the national chairman of the party, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun.

Clearing initial doubts as to the authenticity of the letter, Tinubu’s Media Officer, Tunde Rahman, told Ripples Nigeria Thursday evening, when asked to confirm that his boss had actually written Oyegun, that the letter was “authentic”.

In the letter, Tinubu accused Odigie-Oyegun, who is also a former governor of Edo State of sabotaging his efforts at carrying out the assignment handed down to him by President Muhammadu Buhari to reconcile aggrieved members of the party.

Tinubu in the letter, copied the president, Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, Senate President Bukola Saraki and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara.

The former Lagos State governor further alleged that the national chairman of the party was going against an agreement they had during discussions at the party secretariat when President Buhari gave him the assignment of reconciling aggrieved members of the party.

In the letter, dated February 21, 2018, Tinubu said “disappointment greeted me when I discovered that you had swiftly acted in contravention of the spirit of our discussions. Instead of being a bulwark of support as promised, you positioned yourself in active opposition to the goal of resuscitating the progressive and democratic nature of APC”.

Tinubu lamented that Oyegun had taken it as a “personal ambition to thwart my presidential assignment” in some key states including Kogi, Kaduna, Kano and Adamawa which the hair man acknowledged were places affected by serious party issues.

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While pointing at the party’s boss for rushing to Kogi state to unilaterally inaugurate officials “parallel to the officials already heading the state chapter of the party”, Tinubu wrote, that “While this may place you in significant affinity with those parallel officials you handpicked, this machination suggests no improvement in the welfare of the party in Kogi or at the national level”.

He further wrote in the letter that Odigie-Oyegun may be seeking “to undermine my mandate by engaging in dilatory tactics for the most part. When forced to act, you do so in an arbitrary and capricious manner”.

He stated that the party belongs to all members, and that even if Odigie-Oyegun had personal qualms with him, he had “no right to thwart my presidential assignment in these key states”

He further called on the national chairman to cease taking any more “improper unilateral decisions with regard to the national and state chapters of the party”.

“In furtherance… I request that you make available to me the status reports and all the pertinent information regarding the state chapters without further delay”, Tinubu demanded of Odigie-Oyegun.

It would be recalled that both men fell apart in 2016 in the wake of the party’s primary for the governorship election in Ondo State, when TINUBU’s candidate for the plum job was dropped for Rotimi Akeredolu.

Tinubu blames Odigie-Oyegun for that loss, and called for his resignation.

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