 Now, Ex-Presidential Candidate Adamu Galba edges the all-progressive Congress ABC to postpone the party's convention to avoid implosion. And again, Nigeria drops in latest transparency into national corruption, Ranken. This is plus politics, and I am Justin Agadone. An ABC shifted an Ex-Presidential Candidate in the 2019 General Elections, Adamu Galba II has asked the leadership of the party to postpone the party's convention scheduled to hold on February the 26th this year, saying going ahead with it could lead to implosion. He said the exercise should not take place until war infactions within the party resolve their differences. Now this costs him with me. Ex-Presidential Candidate and the CEO of IPI Solutions, Adamu Galba II. Many thanks for joining us on the show this evening. Thank you very much, Justin. Yeah, it is our pleasure. Let's just dive into the issue for the day, and specifically you're calling for the suspension of the APC's convention. What exactly are your reasons? Yeah, my reason has to do with the confusion that came about after state congresses was conducted. You know, we had last year from June airport, we had these state congresses where we produce state leaders in the party, in state leadership of the party in each step, and suddenly there are so many factions that emerge, each of them struggling to legitimize themselves as the authentic and duly elected members of APC in such a set, especially the executive leadership. In most of these states, about 14 of these states, we have parallel leadership. However, you have different chairmen, at least two, contesting for the same chairmanship position. And as I'm taking to you right now, the same situation still prevails where we have series of questions in different states of the federation asking about contesting for their legitimacy in the APC. So if you have this kind of situation, and you organize a national convention where you are expecting all these chunks to come into the convention ground, how are you going to legitimize what mechanism are you going to use to legitimize or to determine which of the factions is actually the legitimate one? And in a party politics, you don't want to lose a single member. If you legitimize chairman A, what do you think the feeling of chairman B will be? Maybe chairman B may decide to say he's leaving the party and we are losing a crisis within the party structure as a result of the last convention that convened, state congresses that was held. And therefore there is need for ample time for deep level and high level reconciliation meetings across all these state structures where we have issues to come on board, reconcile their differences so that each state we can understand this is the legitimate chairman so that when we come to the convention ground it will be an easy ride and a very unified convention. But as a current, if we decide to do that, it's going to be a very serious problem because in each one of these states, there are even legal cases that are registered between the two contestants. This guy will believe he's a legitimate person and you rush to the court to seek legitimacy and the other one rush to the court, that means you are pending court cases across most of these states and even the legitimacy of the CECPC itself, the Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee is contested by some agreed members. Even though we know that the CECPC was appointed by the president, commander-in-chief of the armed forces with the party leader, he nominated them after the disbandment of the previous executive committee of the party. Now some people are contrasting for their legitimacy so this contest is still hanging in courts. So imagine if perhaps maybe we did convention and one of the court cases came out and legitimized the CECPC, what is going to be the position of the hit-and-toe elected members of the party afterward? So that's a very serious problem. We have a lot of issues that have to do with politics, that have to do with legal, that have to do with so many issues that until we have ample time to move around and reconcile these differences, I don't see it very necessary for us to rush into convention when we know that we're having a divided party. In fact, even if we come into convention, who is going to be the party chairman in perhaps maybe Zanfarah state? Because it's Zanfarah state, we don't have a party chairman. There is no congress that was conducted there. We don't have congress that is conducted in Anambara state after producing Andy Hubert as party chairman. What came back later? No party chairman, simply because there is no executive committee within the state that nominated him as the legitimate candidate of the party to participate in the last convention. So imagine if he has won that election, but now we will have lost this, we have to Zanfarah state. So it's a serious issue and we believe that we have to postpone this convention until all these issues are sorted out properly. Let's talk about these issues from your opening and more that you have said so far. You have been able to identify that there are at least four, ten states that have factions brewing among themselves. If I may ask, if you would enter me, really, how did all of this wound this down? How come the APC, which have been adjudiced one of the most formidable parties in Nigeria, is now actually at this particular stage where they cannot actually hold themselves as one body? Yes, the problem is APC is a convergence of different political parties. If you could recall, we have AAPPC, CPC, ACN and ABGA that came together to form what we now see as APC. So now that we have a transiting president who was the central redefined figure that brought about this measure to produce this mega-particle APC, it's now transiting out or his tenure is going to expire in 2023. So there is need for a new leadership that is expected to substitute the president normally in democracy. But the problem is different camps between the CPC, the AMPP, the ACN and Co, all of them are struggling to be the president. You can see Ashura Gura declared who is from ACN bloc. You have Ojiuzo Kalu who declared who was from PDP bloc, the new PDP bloc. And we also had Okorocha today declaring who is from ABGA bloc. So different factions want to have the control of the party after the exit of President Mahmoud Mouhani. And that's where the problem is. Let me just put this in edgewise. Did the APC see all of this coming? Over time, people have described the APC as a marriage of different wives all living together in one house. But over time, if you have all of this divergent interest over the years, shouldn't the party have been able to reconcile all factions and the measure that they get some sort of interest that at the end of the day, the national interest of the party actually stays? You are completely right. You see, that is why my advocacy about the suspension of the Convention makes sense. Why? Because we need to have a very solid and strong reconciliation committee, a very serious conflict, internal conflict resolution mechanism that need to be established because when you have a merger, it's like talking about having different factions coming together. Prior to that coming together, they were all in opposition to one another. And suddenly they come together. Something was bound to them. Something was binding together. And that thing is continuous conflict resolution mechanism that will ensure and guarantee everybody's interest is properly protected. But that was not instituted because of the crisis that the party keep having. If you remember this chairman that we have the governor of the state, who is the chairman of the ordinary committee. He is the chairman of the party. We have, in fact, there is even a founding chairman of the party who is like, who this year can be. Then we now have Oegu, who is the first chairman of the party. We now have Adam Foshomole, and now we have him, that's my Malak. So there is different crisis, simply because the party had not established a very strong conflict mechanism, a resolution mechanism over time. But now that we are coming into convention, and we know the consequences of losing power, because we have seen what happened, what is happening currently to GDP, that has transformed from Africa largest party to Africa's Jamboree party, because we have nothing now. We should also take lessons from there. Now that we have chairman of the party, the ordinary convention committee that is able to provide some level of stability over a period of more than one year. It is important for us to leverage on this opportunity to create a solid conflict resolution mechanism that can move around and consolidate each and every member's base on the block that brought them into the APC so that we can have a very strong united party that we go into convention. In fact, it does not even make sense for us to go into convention to contest, because sometime contestation could bring about problem. It is important for us to get into convention on consensus ground. However, we know who is going to emerge in each of the party positions, because it was agreed, negotiated, and discussed about. But currently, with the constitution of the party where we have factions in each state, that used to belong to different political parties, fighting one another over the control of the party in both states, going into convention ground again, I think we are going to just explore the problem to a national level, and we shouldn't do that. And you look at what is happening in Kano, for instance. Mano Shekarao and Ganjujie belongs to different political parties. Mano Shekarao came from MPP block, and Ganjujie came from PDP block. Now that President Bahri is exiting, Mano Shekarao has spoiled six different from Ganjujie. Ganjujie is thinking of one person to succeed as the president to succeed President Mahmoud Buhari, while Mano Shekarao is suspecting somebody else to succeed President Mahmoud Buhari. And with these differences, you now have different factions to support their own emergent candidates. So that is the situation that is happening across the state. We have the same situation in Oyo State, we have the same situation in Oshin State, we have the same situation in Gombe State, we have the same situation in Oupara, we have the same situation in many states in Nadeed, where the MPC is the ruling party. So we need to really, really pay serious attention to make sure we resolve this problem before we get into convention. All right, now, but then again, Adam, have you been able to reach out to the leadership of the party so far to maybe convince them on the need to postpone this party and what are the feelings that you are getting? Yes, so far we have done a lot about advocacy, we have written to the party, we have written to pages of newspapers so that the general members of the party across the country can know. All of them are reading papers, they are leading national denies, I'm sure they are watching plus TV. So with all these things, they will be able to understand that there's a situation within the party, as I'm talking to you, there are so many members of the party that are also having the same feeling as I'm having now. So with this, especially us, that knows no any other party other than the APC. I always say that I jumped from PDB to join APC. So I don't know any ACN, CPC, MPP, whatever. All I know is APC. So with this, we have to protect the interests of the party first. So we are doing that, we are doing advocacy, we are creating awareness as much as possible, the dangers that we are facing if we go into convention as a divided house. Because we had similar problem with PDB during the run-up to 2015 election. When PDB decided to host convention and there are so many governors that decided to judge some PDB right on the convention ground and not brought about the failure of PDB. So we cannot give PDB the same opportunity they gave us that time. We should be more mature and more organized. So we continue to do this. We are even looking at organizing members nationally so that we can match to the party secretariat and notify the chairman of the Chiathika Astronomical Convention Committee, His Excellency my Malabuni and the National Executive Committee that has considered as Chiathika to kindly consider postponing this convention, this upcoming convention so that they have ample time to be able to resolve this problem. Maybe having additional three or four months to be able to consolidate these differences so that when we go into our convention we will match stronger and face the opposition and win power in 2023. Let's do talk about the reconciliation processes that have been going on so far in the APC. How would you say the Bonilla, the CCEPC have has gone so far in reconciling all of factions because right now we still have 14 in a state that you have mentioned so far. Would you really say they're actually making grounds or carving grounds as it were? I think it'd be extraordinary. The reconciliation committee that was constituted did not, it was a very good attempt under the distinguished leadership of Senator Abdullah Adamu of Nassara State. But unfortunately I think we didn't do a good job. Maybe we may have consulation in Lagos State because in Lagos you have the Muiz-Bani Re faction and they are sure a new faction. So I think that faction now is sorted. Maybe that's the only place I can count a positive. Golden State, there are still strong effort to see that the Nandjuma Goja faction and the current Govno Inuiiris Excellency Govno Inuiiris faction sorted the problem. But as I'm telling you in Govno Excellency we are losing members to PDP. So many people are just moving back to PDP simply because they don't see the possibility of that kind of resolution. And they are trying to go back to their traditional zone because Goja was coming from PDP to APC. So they are trying to move back to the previous party and this is a great loss to us. And Malan Ibrahim Shekharau and the Gandujia faction, I saw them I think yesterday to see my Malabuni and there were some good press statements. But I am not sure that this press statement is going to turn over because based on the information I have from the people that went there, there are still so many great areas that I have to address to be addressed. So if the Govno faction will have to come to see my Malabuni at the center, so it means that there is still a problem. So when you look at it, in fact, if you go to Delta State for instance, DSP or Deputy Senate President Omo Agege and the faction that is for the minister and great agor, I have a very serious problem. In fact, they don't even see I2I. So how do you say with this kind of outcome that we have a very strong resolution that can be able to convey what's in two successful conventions? I want us to talk about... Yes, I want us to talk about what you said in passing, you know, the meeting between Shekharau and Gandujia. That's the issues in our Canustin and you said there are still great areas to be addressed in that particular state. Can you bring us up specifically on these great areas that you just talked about? Yeah, the great areas is that we still have pending court cases that also the Warring Parties took to the court and we still don't know, even though there are some letters that are just flying online, that says that Panzergon Faction is a duly recognized faction of the party, you know, by the party, the Gandujia section is still contesting it under Alagea Bas. So when you look at this, the Alagea Bas faction did not come out and accept Panzergon as the duly elected Shekharau man of the APC and that faction now is the faction that is organized by the APC until there is a strong press statement from the Gandujia faction that has accepted the Panzergon faction, there are still very much great areas. So if there is a resolution, you shall have faction A supporting faction B or faction B supporting faction A, then you now know that you have reached a Mukabur resolution, but so far there are still issues. All right, at the sometime last year, specifically in December, we had here on Plus TV, we had some members of the APC use development and solidarity forum and they had talked about organizing a parallel convention come February 26th this year because they said they're not really happy with the way things are going on in the APC, specifically, you know, the young people that's the youth and being carried along in the decision-making process in the APC, I want you to react to that. Yes, actually, I am aware of the faction of the group of youth that felt disenfranchised by the party and that decided to form a committee as a pressure group to pressure the party to do the right thing. Very fantastic in democracy. And I think I'm a little bit in one of their two meetings, you know, when it started, personally. But again, creating a parallel faction now goes against the principles of establishment of the party and even the constitution of the party. The party must have one chairman and it must be established through legitimate angle. A situation whereby the president of the federal republic of Nigeria, President Muhammad Buhari's GCFR, who is the party leader, decided to appoint a chaotic extraordinary convention planning committee to steer the party to a successful convention. I do not think Nigerians or any party member should accept any person as a parallel member to be able to conduct anything called parallel convention. That's somewhat like a reasonable attempt to divide the party for that than to seek legitimacy to make it better. The best way, as we young people, I know that all of us young people are actually not getting the right attention in the party and that is why, personally, I'm even making this advocacy of shifting the convention so that even our own interests as young people can be properly negotiated in the party. The best solution that young people can do is to be a pressure group within the party. You don't have to go outside the party and begin to pressure the party by creating a parallel party structure, a situation whereby somebody decided to appoint himself chairman of APC, who now assumed constitutional responsibility according to that person to conduct parallel Congress outside the established party structure that, to me, is a destructive attempt at the party than even making it better. The best solution is to stay within the party and do the right thing. And obeying Mr. President because he is the leader of the country and God willing, he is the party leader because the party that brought him to power is the party that is having the problem and is the president attempt to solve the problem by appointing this caretaker committee. So it is our responsibility to support the caretaker committee to deliver the right thing. But at the same time, if we are not comfortable with what is happening, we should advocate until that thing that we want is done to the betterment of all party members, not to go from outside the window and begin to say, well, when to say to the parallel convention. If we do that, we are actually destroying the party much more than we united. So I don't buy into that idea. I think it's too shallow and that we should stop this kind of thing and pay attention to supporting the party to deliver a very united convention. I think now the party don't need more divisions. What we need is unity and strength so that when we go into convention, we will go strongly and win election. Party or election time is a warfare time. I'm glad you've mentioned election time. You are divided commanders to the war front. I'm glad you have mentioned it's election time because of course we are preparing for a general election to come next year and even though our elections are for this year and some primaries are going to be held, though it is one in mind. But let's talk about the chances of the APC growing by all of those that we are saying, the issues of postponement of convention over time, the issue of this unity and this enfranchisement of some young people. So do you think all of these may affect the chances of the APC ahead of the 2023 elections? That is actually why we are advocating for a very strong conflict resolution mechanism that will bring everybody on board, mainstream every member of the party so that if you get into that convention, we should be able to show that we are united and stronger together. But if you go this convention with immature planning, just because some people are preserving that the convention shall be held and we jumped into it and then you know how factions decided to judge some of the convention and pull out of the party, right on the convention ground, our chances of winning the 2023 election will be magical, will be a mystery. And it is not good for you to go to war front, imagine or hope it to win. You must go to war front ensuring that you have all the ass now necessarily required to be able to bring down your enemy. And the opposition is always supposed to be losing for a very strong draft rule that is united. But the situation wherever we get into convention and we have implosion, so many members are willing to leave the party, weakening the strength of the party, thereby giving advantage to the opposition. And most people that understand the value of hosting political power in the party, if they lose this election, if APC eventually lost this election in 2023, what we see PDP is facing today, APC's case is going to be very worse, very much worse. Because in APC case, everybody will go into their own individual hearts the way they used to be and begin to contest for power at the very small level, the regional level, if not altogether disappearing. So the best solution is to all bury our egos, come together as a united members of the party so that we can win this 2023 election, but if this convention implodes, if this convention implodes, I'm telling you that our chances of winning 2023-2023 election will be a mystery. And that should never happen if we truly are genuine and patriotic members of the party and want this success for the party. Thank you, Adamu. Indeed, we just hope that the APC as a party will be able to put its house in order and ensure that all members are actually carried along. Thank you so much yet again for your time and we do appreciate it. We were joined by Adamu Garba, former presidential candidate in the 2019 election and he is the CEO of IPI Solutions. Thank you again, Adamu Garba, for joining us on this particular discourse. Thank you very much for having me. Thank you. Otherwise, there's two plus politics and plus TV Africa will take a short break now and when we reach here, we'll look at Nigeria's ranking and the 2021 corruption perceptions index in a moment to join us again.