NNPP faction: Kwankwaso’s plan to join APC is personal, not party’s decision

The Agbo Major-led faction of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) has distanced itself from plans by Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, the party’s 2023 presidential candidate, to join the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Kwankwaso, a former governor of Kano State, had said on Saturday that he and his loyalists were ready to join the APC if certain conditions were met.

But in a statement on Monday in Lagos, Ogini Olaposi, national secretary of the Agbo Major-led faction, said the move is a personal agenda of the Kwankwasiyya Movement and not that of the NNPP.

Olabisi said Kwankwaso’s declaration proved he and his movement were no longer part of the NNPP.

“At last we have been vindicated. All negotiations by any party with Kwankwaso should be done in his individual capacity,” Olaposi said. 

“Our party will now rest from the Movement’s resistance after they were expelled for anti-party activities.”

Olaposi said the NNPP has no issue with the ruling party, but any alliance ahead of 2027 would be a collective decision of members.

“For now, we are putting our house in order ahead of elections nationwide after the crisis and litigations that Kwankwaso and his followers brought to the NNPP,” he said.

According to him, the memorandum of understanding between the Kwankwasiyya Movement and the NNPP ended after the 2023 presidential election.

“The crisis began because rather than leave peacefully, they began to plan to hijack the party. We can’t wait to see them in another party,” he added.

The NNPP factional secretary said Kwankwaso no longer has a political platform, adding that most of his followers in Kano had joined the APC long ago.

“Kwankwaso has no political party. His political value dipped after betraying the NNPP that gave him a free platform for his presidential ambition and when the strategic members of the movement joined the ruling party,” he said.

“Nigerians who negotiate with Kwankwaso and his group should know that it is on his right as a citizen but not as a member of the NNPP. Any negotiation in the name of NNPP is null and void because they remain expelled from our party.”

Olaposi also criticised the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for delaying the upload of the party’s new executive after a court-ordered convention that produced the Agbo Major-led leadership.