TheCable

Salihu Lukman, a former vice-chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the north-west, says leaders of the party should stop President Bola Tinubu from operating a closed government.

In a statement on Wednesday, Lukman said the party leaders need to call the president to order for him to recover “whatever is left of his democratic and progressive credentials”.

The APC chieftain said Tinubu and the leaders of the party should resist the “temptation of towing the path of self-destruction by continuing to operate as a closed government”.

“Our leaders who led the merger negotiation to produce APC in 2013 owe it to Nigerians to call President Asiwaju Tinubu to order and get him to recover whatever is left of his democratic and progressive credentials,” he said.

“Both as APC and Nigerians, we all have a responsibility to make all the needed sacrifices to win President Asiwaju Tinubu administration back and put it on the path of emerging as an inclusive government managed by an envisioned progressive party, APC.

“Even with that, the objective of grabbing power is limited to supporting former President Buhari and President Asiwaju Tinubu to achieve their ambitions of becoming Presidents. All the sacrifices made by leaders of legacy parties that merged to produce the APC have been jettisoned.

“It is very disappointing that we have successfully created a party, which has won three elections consecutively with hardly anything to show for it other than leaders who continue to manage the affairs of government exclusively in the mode of dictatorship.

“As leaders in APC, we must accept responsibility for the present unfortunate reality whereby for the first time we have produced an elected government, which is practically scornful to other political leaders.

“Since the time of former President Buhari, we have succeeded in producing elected governments that audaciously imagine that they can manage the affairs of this country exclusively without allowing permissible consultations as provided in the APC constitution.”

Lukman said the current political leaders are behaving more as “overlords” instead of being proactive to avert “looming danger”.