APC moves to expand NEC membership, passes vote of confidence on Tinubu, Ganduje

The All Progressives Congress (APC) is moving to expand the membership of its National Executive Committee (NEC) to accommodate more members, the party’s spokesperson, Felix Morka, said on Wednesday.

Addressing a press conference after the NEC meeting held at the party’s secretariat in Abuja, Mr Morka said a seven-member committee led by the Governor of Yobe State, Mala Buni, has been raised to determine the criteria for bringing new members into the organ.

He said the motion was raised at the NEC meeting, and the committee was set up to look into it.

Vote of confidence

Mr Morka also explained that the NEC expressed confidence in President Bola Tinubu’s leadership of the country and Abdullahi Ganduje’s steering of the party.

“NEC also passed a vote of confidence on our National Chairman, Dr Abdullahi Ganduje, for the remarkable record of successes that he has led the party to attain. Successes, not just in terms of electoral victory…but, more importantly, in holding the party together and forging opportunities for members of the party to dialogue and engage with each other and express themselves and ensure that we operate more cordially than some of our competition in the opposition, who clearly continue to suffer from self-intelligence,” he said.

“That vote of confidence was also extended to the entire National Working Committee, as led by Dr Ganduje, our national chairman.”

He said the NEC also approved the party’s audited financial statements and the budgets as presented to the meeting.

The NEC meeting was the first under President Tinubu, who assumed office on the party’s platform in May 2023.

It was attended by the president, his deputy, Kashim Shettima, Senate President Godswill Akpabio, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Abbas Tajudeen.

Buhari, El-Rufai, others absent

However, key NEC members, such as former President Muhammadu Buhari and the former governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, were absent from the NEC meeting.

In separate comments, Messrs Buhari and El-Rufai said they couldn’t attend because they got the invitation late.

Mr Buhari was the party’s first successful presidential candidate in 2015. He was also nominated by the party again in 2019.

Speaking to the BBC Hausa on Wednesday, Mr Buhari’s media adviser, Garba Shehu, said: “President Muhammadu Buhari is not a caucus member of the party. He was supposed to attend the NEC meeting, but unfortunately, the invitation to the meeting was forwarded to him on Monday, and it reached him on Tuesday. For this, he could not leave Daura for Abuja even if he owns a private jet.”

Mr El-Rufai had said in a recent interview with Arise Television that he had made plans to be in Egypt when the NEC meeting was to be held.

“Unfortunately, I won’t attend the APC National Caucus meeting because I will be on my way to Cairo, where I spend most of my time. I didn’t get adequate notice,” he said.

“The Constitution of our party requests 21 days or, I think,14 days’ notice for this kind of national organ meeting. I don’t think that notice was given. If it was given, I don’t think I’d received such an invitation.”

Party invited all -Morka

Speaking at the press conference, Mr Morka, the APC spokesperson, said all NEC members received an invitation and he could not say why some of them could not attend the meeting.

However, he noted that the NEC meetings do not always have all members present due to differing schedules.

“As far as I know, I have never known the caucus meeting of our party or the NEC meeting of our party to be attended 100 per cent by all of the members of the NEC or caucus. And I’m not sure that there’s really any political party that attains 100 per cent attendance at meetings,” he said.

“You know, when you call meetings, part of the reason these meetings are difficult to call is because you know there’s a lot of negotiation, a lot of back-end negotiation; you know of the convenient availability of key leaders who were required to be at the meeting.”