The Forum of All Progressives Congress (APC) Non-National Working Committee has distanced itself from tenure elongation of the party’s executive leadership, saying it supported President Muhammadu Buhari`s position.
The group called for the dissolution of executive committees of the party at all levels and the convocation of a national convention to elect new executives.
The position of the Forum was part of the resolutions reached at the end of its meeting on Sunday in Abuja.
In a communiqué read by its Spokesman, Mr Jock Alamba, the forum said “we share the President’s unalloyed commitment to the rule of law and fine tenets of internal democracy”.
It stated that by opposing the tenure extension approved by the party`s National Executive Committee (NEC) in its meeting on Feb. 27, Buhari was laying a foundation to further deepen the country`s democracy.
It said that they were with the president on his position that election to party offices, starting from Ward, Local Government and State Congresses to National Convention be conducted unencumbered, with free and fair elections.
According to it, with all hands on deck, the party can avoid the risk of rancorous and conflict-ridden intra-party elections which make majority of the leaders to clamour for tenure extension.
The forum urged members and supporters of the party to disregard reports in some quarters that governors elected on its platform were plotting to use the party`s chairmen against Buhari.
“There is no such plot, and no chairman is against Buhari; we are all behind him,’’ it said.
It expressed belief that as in the Dec. 14, 2014 presidential primary and other primary elections, “APC members would work as a family to disappoint distractors’’.
Meanwhile, President Muhammadu Buhari will on Monday leave Abuja for an official visit to United Kingdom, the President’s Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu disclosed in a statement in Abuja on Sunday.
Shehu stated that the president while in Britain would hold discussions on Nigeria – British relations with Prime Minister Mrs Theresa May, prior to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings scheduled for April 18 to 20.
“The President will also meet the Chief Executive Officer of Royal Dutch Plc, Mr Ben van Beurden in connection with Shell and other partners’ plan to invest $15b in Nigeria’s oil industry.
“These investment ventures will lay the foundation for the next 20 years production and domestic gas supply, bringing with it all the attendant benefits both to the economy and the wider society.”
Shehu said that President Buhari would also renew discussions with the Archbishop of Canterbury, The Most Rev. and Rt. Hon. Justin Welby, “a good friend of the President on inter-religious harmony in Nigeria and World-wide.”
He said that further meetings had also been scheduled for the President to see some prominent British and Nigerians residing in Britain.
