2027: APC mulls granting Edo, Delta lawmakers, others automatic return tickets

.As Housing Minister, Atah opposes Kwakwanso’s alleged plan to join ruling party

 

CYRIL MBAH, Abuja

 

Gladdened by the swelling numbers of its membership due to endless defections of opposition politicians into the party, the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has promised to cooperate and harmoniously integrate the new members, into the party structures without unnecessary demands and preconditions.

 

While welcoming the members of the House of Representatives and all the members of the Delta and Edo state Houses of Assembly elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), including the Speaker, Rt. Hon. Emomotimi Guwor and Blessing Agbebaku to the party.

 

The APC applauded their decision to leave the sinking Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), pointing out that it was in their best interests to do so.

 

In a statement issued on Wednesday and signed by Barrister Felix Morka, National Publicity Secretary, the All Progressives Congress (APC) said, “We also welcome the Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Blessing Agbebaku, and his colleagues who have also announced their decision to join the APC.

 

“The All Progressives Congress (APC) applauds the decision of six honourable members of the House of Representatives and all 22 honourable members of the House of Assembly elected on the platform of the Delta state chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), including the Speaker, Rt. Hon. Emomotimi Guwor, to join our great Party.

 

“We also welcome the Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Blessing Agbebaku, and his colleagues who have also announced their decision to join the APC.

 

“The entrance of these leaders and their supporters into our Party attests to the transformational leadership of President Bola Tinubu, and an endorsement of the administration’s Renewed Hope Agenda and its associated economic reform policies.”

 

Inside sources told newsmen authoritatively that as compensation for the new entrants and a mark of goodwill, older APC members who have ambitions to contest elections in 2027 to the legislature would be persuaded to drop out and support the lawmakers to complete eight years in office.

 

The APC statement hinted at this development by saying, “We assure the incoming lawmakers of our cooperation and accommodation as they integrate fully into the APC political family.”

 

Meanwhile, the rumoured plans of the former Presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) to also join the All Progressives Congress (APC) has hit the rocks as several politicians from Kano State,  who are members of the APC, have  opposed the planned movement.

 

The Minister of State, Housing and Urban Development, Yusuf Atah joined the growing antagonists who are against Kwankwaso’s movement to the All Progressives Congress (APC) and he made this public in Abuja on Tuesday when he told the National Chairman of the party, Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje before newsmen that the planned defection of the former Governor of Kano State, Musa Rabiu Kwankwaso to the APC was a bad omen.

 

The minister said Kwankwaso, a former Minister of Defence has become unattractive and irrelevant in Kano State politics and has become a political liability and a politician on the way to permanent retirement, but Dr. Ganduje countered by stating that the APC will not reject anyone who wishes to join the party because “a friend in need is a friend indeed.”

 

Minister Yusuf Atah during, an interview with newsmen after meeting with Dr. Ganduje at the APC Secretariat, said vehemently that Kwankwaso will not be welcomed to the APC, claiming that the politician will import his present political predicament in NNPP and his endless electoral struggles to the APC, pointing out that the ‘Kwankwasiya Movement’ which Kwankwaso relies on has died in Kano.”