A former National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Adams Oshiomhole, on Tuesday said the party spent a whopping sum of N2.4 billion to win the governorship elections in Kwara, Imo, and Ogun States.
Oshiomhole, who spoke at the book launch of the former APC National Vice Chairman North West, Salihu Lukman, also said that the party lost the Taraba State governorship election even though it invested N800 million into the election in 2019.
Giving his goodwill message and his scorecard as APC National Chairman, the APC chieftain said the party spent N800 million for the governorship elections in Imo, Kwara, Ogun, and Taraba States, while N500 million was spent in each of the other states.
According to him, the need to spend N800 million in Imo, Ogun, Kwara, and Taraba was because they had strong opposition leaders in those states.
For Imo State, he said that there was Senator Rochas Okorocha, who was against the candidate of the party; Kwara had former Senate President, Senator Bukola Saraki and in Ogun State, we had Senator Ibukunle Amosun who worked against the candidate of the party, Dapo Abiodun.
The APC former National Chairman said no other National Working Committee of the party had invested as much as his NWC in an election.
He however faulted the procedure of his removal from office, as he blamed Lukman to be a contributor to it.
According to him, the APC governors under the umbrella of the Progressive Governors Forum had used the author of the book: “APC and Transition Politics” to fight him in office for instituting party supremacy.
He said, “We spent N800 million in Kwara under ‘O to ge’ to win election in Kwara State.
“We spent also the same amount in Imo, Ogun, and Taraba.
“No any other NWC had spent as much as we did in any election.”
The book launch had in attendance, former APC National Interim Chairman, Bisi Akande, former Ekiti State governor, Kayode Fayemi, APC National Chairman, Abdullahi Ganduje, APC NWC members, government functionaries, and some academia.
Lukman, the author of the book received bashing and praises from party members.
Fayemi, in his remarks, said, “More often than not, some of us who are close to him are at the receiving end when Lukman writes.
“I remember in his days as the Director General of the Progressives Governors Forum, every time he wrote and former Governor Ganduje will remember this in our various meetings at the forum somebody gets accused by his own colleagues as the architect who brought Lukman into the Progressives Governors Forum and I am one. And when my brother Governors got one my neck because Lukman has written one diatribe or the other against even Governors who are paying his salary until the day that my brother Governors insisted that yes, enough today Lukman will resign as Director General of this forum and if he refuses to resign then they will resign as members of the Progressive Governors Forum. Eventually we agreed collectively that we must work on an exit strategy and when he was informed, two of us were directed to undertake the assignment I believe Governor Nasir El Rufai who is also often blamed as a Lukman promoter, and myself and we told him, he said thank God, finally I can now do it properly.
“So when you see him write what he does on the party the impression is that this is a man who is out to destroy, denigrate, find fault for the sake of finding fault, to bring down anything that he perceived is good. The truth as many of us know is that is precisely the opposite that is responsible for whatever Lukman does. If Lukman had been somebody after personal aggrandizement he could have had any position even under President Jonathan.
“Lukman was the engine room for Save Nigeria Group. Jonathan became a personal beneficiary. That doesn’t stop him from starting his campaign against Jonathan and bad government.
“If there is anybody who can be described as the conscience of the All Progressives Congress and progressive politics in Nigeria today, more than any of us is Salihu Mohammed Lukman.”
Lukman, in his remarks, said, “One of the driving forces for me was basically to stimulate discussion within the party and hopefully get the party leaders to own it and maybe mainstream it into the structures of the party.
“One of the things we were afraid of when planning the event, was a situation where we end up talking to ourselves. This indeed reflected a lot in the presentations here, keeping the kind of image I know I have acquired for myself, it will be difficult to have the confidence that leaders will be here.
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“That His Excellency, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje is now the National Chairman, after all, and including all that Comrade Adams Oshiomole has reflected on, even after all I have canvassed publicly, it is a clear demonstration of the fact that this party (APC) had a clear future. What is required is to try and give critical support to all our leaders so that they can revive all the structures of the party.”
