Protesters storm APC secretariat, demand party chairman’s resignation

Scores of demonstrators stormed the All Progressives Congress national secretariat in Abuja on Thursday, demanding the resignation of the party’s national chairman, Dr. Abdullahi Ganduje, following his recent suspension by a faction of his ward executives and the Kano State government’s alleged bribery charge against him.

Chanting solidarity songs and holding banners reading “Ganduje must resign” and “Return the APC chairmanship to North Central,” the protesters urged President Bola Tinubu and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, George Akume, to consider returning the party’s leadership to their region.

The agitation comes two days after Ganduje received a vote of confidence from the Forum of APC State Chairmen, allowing him to continue as national chairman.

The support was given by a group of 37 state chairmen during a solidarity visit to the party’s national secretariat.

The former governor was recently suspended again by a portion of the Ganduje Ward in Kano’s Dawakin Tofa Local Administration Area, which the ruling party said was carried out by some impostors purportedly sponsored by the state administration.

Addressing reporters in Abuja, protesters representing Concerned North Central APC Stakeholders condemned Ganduje’s continuing tenure in office as an obvious violation of the party’s zoning process.

The demonstrators’ leader, Mohammed Mahmud Saba, revealed that, unlike the 37 APC state chairmen, his people in the North Central have voted no confidence in the national chairman and requested his immediate resignation.

Saba emphasised that the people of North Central felt betrayed when the job of APC national chairman was taken away from them following Senator Abdullahi Adamu’s resignation, despite the fact that Tinubu received the third most votes in the 2023 presidential election, trailing only North and South West.

He said, “We, the North Central APC Concerned Stakeholders, have resolved to unanimously agitate for our rights and reclaim our mandate, which was handed to us by the National Convention of our great party in 2022. Various sections of our constitution have established the procedure for replacing an executive member at all levels of the party in the event of death, resignation, incapacitation, or expulsion from the party by any executive member.

“It is a fact that the emergence of Dr. Umar Ganduje as national chairman was done against the spirit and soul of the APC, which is the constitution of our great party. This singular act has impacted us negatively as a people in the North Central. We feel betrayed and spited because we gave His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the third highest votes after the North West and South West in the country, which put us in a better position to enjoy the fruit of our labour.

“We, therefore, demand that Dr. Umar Ganduje resign immediately and stop parading himself as the National Chairman of our great party; the zoning arrangements made by the National Convention in 2022, which zoned the office of the national chairman to the North Central, be respected by the NEC and all other organs of the party; and that all governors elected on the platform of the APC in the North Central should wake up from their slumber and mobilise their members against this impunity until Ganduje resigns as the national chairman.”

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