APC crisis: Let bygones be bygones – Gov Bello tells party leaders

Governor Sani Abubakar Bello of Niger State has called on the stalwarts of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to ‘let bygones be bygones’.

He said the party leaders must sheath their swords and put their houses in order ahead of the 2023 elections.

Recall that the governor declared himself the acting National Chairman of the APC on Monday.

He made the call to the APC leaders at a meeting where he addressed State chairmen of the party.

“By the time you get back, you will unite the party in your various States,” Governor Bello said.

“Please, please, please, let bygones be bygones. You have to bring everyone together, those that were for you and against you.

“What we want is a united, unified APC in your various States, because we have elections around the corner and we hope and pray that by God’s grace, we will have a better result in 2023 than in 2019,” Bello charged the State party leaders.

Bello resumed work as the ruling party’s acting Chairman on Monday but later met a stiff opposition from Yobe State Governor, Mai Mala Buni’s camp

Report suggests that there was a failed move to remove Buni as the chairman of the Caretaker Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee (CECPC) of the APC.

Reports emerged on Monday that President Buhari had approved Buni’s removal and appointed Bello as his replacement to head the CECPC.

But Bello, who addressed some of the party’s internal issues at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja, was forced to do a walk back after he was confronted with the legal implication of the president usurping the powers of the APC National Executive Committee (NEC), the only body that can sack Buni or the CECPC.

He was then forced to accept that he only presided over the meeting of CECPC because Buni was absent.