Who will Mend the Broken Fences in Kwara APC?

Hammed Shittu in Ilorin

It is no more news that the crisis rocking the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kwara State remains unabated, as the factions in the party have refused to sheathe their swords over the control of the party. The crisis started immediately after the party took over the leadership of the state on May 29, 2019.

However, the question yet to be answered now is who will mend the broken fences in the party ahead of the 2023 polls in the state? The two major factions in the party are that of the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed which has three groups in its folds, including that of the Minister of State for Transportation, Senator Rukayah Gbemisola Saraki, the chairman of board of governing council of the Federal Polytechnic, Ado-Ekiti, Chief Iyiola Oyedepo and that of the former Vice Chancellor of the University of Ilorin, Prof. Shuaib Oba Abdulraheem. They called their group ‘Loyal APC’.

The other faction in the party is led by the incumbent governor of the state, Alhaji AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq and the group is called AA Group in the APC.
The party came into power under the amalgamation of political forces which assisted the party to wrestle political power from the control of the former Senate President and Peoples Democratic Party leader, Dr. Bukola Saraki.

The acrimony among factions in the party dates back to the months leading to the 2019 general elections, when politicians of different political and ideological persuasions came together to form a formidable front against the then ruling PDP in the state.

The PDP was quite strong in the state, with considerable followership across the length and breadth of Kwara. It was therefore imperative for those already in the opposition to team up with others who fell out with the ruling PDP in order to defeat loyalists of the Saraki dynasty at the polls.

The development prompted the party to form a movement called “O To Ge” (Enough is Enough) and this platform penetrated all the nooks and crannies of the state which at the end helped the ruling APC to win all the elective positions in the state and at the national assembly. But given the potency of the ‘Otoge Revolution’, the politicians who felt unfairly treated in the primaries had to sheathe their swords and work together for collective victory of then candidate Abdulrazaq AbdulRahman.

Political pundits in the state expected that the emergence of Abdulrazaq as the governorship flag-bearer of the party, and his eventual victory at the general elections, should have helped built bridges and align conflicting interests.

However, two years after mounting the seat of power at the Ahmadu Bello Way Government House, and effectively becoming the “leader” of the party in the state, the governor has failed in his efforts to unite the party members.

Since AbdulRazaq was sworn in as governor, there had been a war of supremacy between him and other major stakeholders of the party in the three senatorial districts in the state, including those holding strategic positions in the government of the federation.

Instead of managing the success, the party has been fragmented and this has continued to cause disharmony. The faction led by Alhaji Lai Mohammed has its secretariat located along Flowers Garden, GRA, Ilorin with Hon. Bashir Omolaja Bolarinwa as its state chairman, while the other state secretariat, led by the governor, is located along former Ministry of Housing, GRA, Ilorin with Alhaji Abdullahi Samari as its state chairman.

The crisis became pronounced when the two factions of the party held separate local government congresses to elect their executives. The congresses, held at the LG secretariats across the 16 local government areas of Kwara, were conducted by factions loyal to Lai Mohammed, and AbdulRazaq.

Both factions adopted consensus arrangements for the congresses as encouraged by the national secretariat. Though, Samari has said that there was no parallel local government congress during the last congress of the party, but some party stakeholders in the other faction of Alhaji Lai Mohammed confirmed to journalists in Ilorin that their faction held its local government congresses in the 16 local government councils areas in the presence of national secretariat officials of the party, security agencies and the Independent National Electoral Commission officials.

The crisis has continued unabated and now looking insurmountable. This will no doubt affect the fortunes of the party ahead of the critical 2023 elections.
But the question on the lips of many party stakeholders in the state now is why has the Kwara APC self-inflicted division defied solution over the last two years? Who will broker peace between the two warring groups in the party ahead of the 2023 polls?

It should be noted that some party members have opined that if the party is interested in sustaining its leadership of the state, it is either the major actors sheathe their swords and come back to the drawing board or the party’s national leadership should wild the big stick.
It has also been opined that non-aligned party bigwigs with considerable influence have a major role to play in mending broken fences.

Abdulrahman is a major player that many believe could help calm frayed nerves within the party, being perhaps the biggest beneficiary of the collective efforts of politicians who united to push for the Otoge revolt.
Earlier in February, a member of the House of Assembly, Hon. Saheed Popoola, said only the governor could resolve the crisis in the state chapter of the party.
He said, “Everything that we are talking about on the crisis still stops at the table of the governor; if he wants it to be settled, it will be settled immediately.

“If the governor doesn’t want it to be settled, there is nobody on earth that will settle it.”
Others that may well have the capacity to douse the tension in the Kwara APC are Mai Mala Buni, the party National Caretaker Chairman himself; the Chief of Staff to the President, Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, who is also from Kwara State and Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in view of his considerable influence on Alhaji Lai Mohammed and Gbemisola Saraki, both federal Ministers from Kwara State.

One other name on the lips of many is the erstwhile Deputy National Chairman of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Mallam Saliu Mustapha, who is candidate for the party’s national chairmanship position. Regarded as one of the party bigwigs with unifying aura, Mustapha is believed to have the capacity to align conflicting sides and build consensus, given his standing in the party in the state and at the national level.
In a recent interview, Mustapha established his appreciation of this concern quite vividly. “It is quite unfortunate that Kwara State’s APC had to find itself in this kind of situation; it is uncalled for; it is unnecessary because it started way too early,” he said.

“But it is understandable that in politics, there would always be a divergence of opinions, views and interests. It is now a task for people like me to see that we reconcile everybody and find a solution to the crisis that has been rocking the party in the past two years. “This is my state, and I will take this as a challenge for me to communicate with all stakeholders and bring back everyone on board in oneness.

“No doubt, this is going to be a litmus test for my capacity and ability to manage crises in the party. I believe that in the shortest time possible, I would be able to achieve this by sitting together with the Governor and other stakeholders of the party in the state and finding a lasting solution to the crisis.

“The crisis is definitely not beyond our capacity to resolve and we shall do so without wasting time, so that we are able to strategise together again and win the next election in the state as overwhelmingly as we did in 2019.”
Commenting on Mustapha’s capacity to mend broken fences, Pastor Bejamin Yissa, a former Speaker of the state’s House of Assembly and presently Chairman of the Governing Board of the Federal University Gusau, Zamfara State, explained that Mustapha has not been fingered in aligning with any of the factions in the crisis.

“Definitely, it’s only a neutral person like Mustapha that can actually come in to intervene in the matter,” he said.
Without mincing words, there is no doubt that time is ticking for the APC in the state. While the party is emnessed in avoidable internecine crisis, the opposition PDP is raking and reaping from it. Some party members of the party last week in Omu-Aran, the headquarters of Irepodun Local Government Council Area publicly defected from the APC to PDP while feelers from other local government councils in the state hinted that more members of the APC are preparing to defect to PDP anytime from now. How this would not affect the fortunes of the APC in Kwara State in 2023, only time will tell.