BY Sodiq Yusuff
The All Progressives Congress (APC) is about to lose another senior member to the ruling party in what political observers are now describing as “the season of defections”.
Former minister of foreign affairs, Chief Tom Ikimi, has concluded plans to return to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which he left nearly 10 years ago to team up with opposition politicians.
Ikimi was a founding member of Action Congress in 2006, a party that later metamorphosed into Action Congress of Nigeria before joining other opposition parties to found APC.
An associate of the politician told TheCable that Ikimi would announce his decision to leave the opposition party “anytime from now”.
“He has lost faith in APC. He has been a pillar of the opposition for years and was shocked at the appalling way he was treated at the last convention of APC. They showed him no respect at all,” the associated said.
Ikimi had wanted to be national chairman of the party but the hierarchy favoured Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, former governor of Edo State.
The opposition to the candidature of Ikimi was said to have been led by Asiwaju Bola Tinubu who was reportedly not comfortable with the “antecedents” of the former national chairman of the now defunct National Republican Convention (NRC) in the aborted third republic.
Ikimi was so angered by the adoption of Oyegun as chairman that he wrote a letter openly criticising Tinubu.
He accused Tinubu of bearing a grudge against him because of his insistence on a religiously balanced APC ticket in the presidential election.
Ikimi also accused Tinubu of unilaterally picking all members of the APC national executive council at the June convention.
But an associate of Tinubu had told TheCable then that Ikimi could not have been made APC chairman.
“We all know his antecedents. It will be suicidal to make Ikimi chairman. He will sell us to President Goodluck Jonathan,” he said.
Ikimi’s candidature was allegedly financed by a top member of the PDP board of trustees.
“It is unfortunate that nobody has tried to reach out to Chief Ikimi to mend fences after what they did to him at the Eagle Square. Not even as a mere gesture. He has no other option that to leave the party, after all his efforts dating back to 2006,” the source told TheCable.
After gaining momentum from the defection of PDP governors and top members of the ruling party to its ranks last year, APC has now found itself in a position where its members are defecting to the ruling party.
Former presidential candidate Malam Nuhu Ribadu is the latest figure to leave APC for PDP, following in the footsteps of former governors Attahiru Bafarawa and Ibrahim Shekarau as well as Brig-General Mohamed Marwa (rtd).
Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, former governor of Borno State, is also believed to be on his way to PDP.
APC, however, is set to gain a big fish following plans by speaker of the house of representatives, Hon. Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, to leave PDP for the opposition party.
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