The Director General of the umbrella body of the governors elected on the platform of the All Progressives Congress, the Progressive Governors Forum, Salihu Moh. Lukman, has told the National Chairman of the APC, Adams Oshiomhole, that the party is worse off under him.
Lukman, in a private letter to Oshiomhole, said the former President of the Nigeria Labour Congress has deviated from the principles that earned him his reputation as a leader.
He said the former Governor of Edo State has refused to handle the crises within the party the way he had done in the past in other leadership positions and failed to call statutory meetings of the party to stave off crisis and carry members along.
The memo, written by the author of Power of Possibility and Politics of Change in Nigeria and dated August 6, 2019, reads in full:
Salihu Moh. Lukman
c/o Progressive Governors Forum
79 Nelson Mandela Street, Asokoro
smlukman@gmail.com
August 6, 2019
HE Comrade Adams Oshiomhole
National Chairman
All Progressives Congress
No. 40 Blantyre Street,
Wuse 2, Abuja
Your Excellency,
APC: Appeal for Reconciliation
Kindly recall that sometime in June this year (2019), I sent what I called a Private Memo on the issues of reported disciplinary actions against Governor Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State by the National Working Committee (NWC). Of course, the Memo noted that before the 2019 elections, the NWC had similarly suspended former Governors Rochas Okorocha and Ibikunle Amosun of Imo and Ogun States respectively. Between June and now, Sen. Lawal Shuaibu, APC Deputy National Chairman, North and Alh. Inuwa Abdulkadir, APC Vice National Chairman, North West have also been similarly suspended. It would appear that the leadership problems facing the party are getting deeper and in the circumstances the business of building the party will be sacrificed. In my letter of July 19, 2019, I have tried to highlight some of the issues of party building as follows:
• Need to prioritise initiatives to reconcile party leaders;
• Completing work on the party’s membership database;
• Strengthening internal processes and procedures for decision on mode of primaries;
• Resolving all challenges related to party funding;
• Issues of discipline;
• Provision of Code of Conduct; and
• Legislative Benchmarks for especially APC NASS members.
Sir, I can imagine that you are not happy with my argument in my July 19 letter to the effect that “emerging realities whereby existing leadership disputes within the party are becoming more and more complicated by actions, inactions, commission or omission. Worse still, all these are compounded by the absence of statutory meetings of party organs as provided in the constitution of the party. This is quite disturbing. I want to strongly appeal to you, sir, to revive what I will refer as the essential Comrade Adams, that excellent negotiator, mediator and conciliator.” Why do I have to take such a position? Perhaps, a reminder to you about how hard you have worked under extreme circumstances to win national recognition and emerge as a national political leader in the country may be important at this point. It was a life journey incubated in the shop floor of Nigerian textile factory – Arewa Textiles, Kaduna, which harvested those negotiating and mediating talents in you that eventually crowned you as an indisputable leader of Nigerian workers. Deploying those negotiating and mediating talents in the services of Nigerian workers’ struggle for workplace and social justice, you distinctively rose as a trade union leader from a steward to General Secretary of a leading industrial union – National Union of Textile, Garment and Tailoring Workers Union (NUTGTWN) – and eventually President of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC). The narrative of your personal development, from the little I know, was about sacrifice, commitment and belief in societal development, based on which minimum standards of livelihood and opportunities for citizens can be guaranteed.
Sir, your life history is so rich and full of inspirations. Many in your generation of union leaders hardly move beyond the trade union platforms. You are the first unionists to graduate from being NLC President, served as a two-term state Governor and emerge as the National Chairman of the governing APC. It is in recognition of this that I argued in my congratulatory letter of June 25, 2018 when you emerged as the APC National Chairman that “you have clearly inherited all the blessings of Imoudu and you are providing illustrious political leadership to our nation in the tradition and vision of our labour movement as founded by Imoudu and his peers of 1940s. However, unlike Imoudu and all our illustrious labour leaders before you, you are able to successfully progress to the national political stage, first as two-term elected governor of Edo State and now as National Chairman of the Governing party, APC. For those of us who may be blessed with some capacity to engage in national discourse, could simplistically reduce this to some public commentaries and in the process exercise some discretionary judgements. I want to sincerely say that it is not a small achievement to start from that humble beginning in the labour movement and emerge as the National Chairman of the Governing party. Congratulations sir!”
Since emerging as the National Chairman of our party, I have had cause to review decisions and actions you have taken as the National Chairman and often I have difficulty reconciling many of the decisions and actions you took with the leadership standards you upheld. For instance, I recall how in Textile Union you don’t allow any possible grievances graduating into leadership conflicts at all levels of the organisation. Some of those grievances get promoted by managements and became difficult to handle based on strict applications of labour relations dispute resolution procedures. As General Secretary, you always ensured prompt interventions, which most times includes your direct involvement. To the best of my recollection, all the cases of interventions led to resolutions of the grievances, sometimes coming with open threats to leaders of the union, especially your person. Without going into specifics, these were the attributes which naturally and eventually elevated you to the leadership of NLC. And I can say without fear of any contradiction, they were attributes that accounted for your successes as NLC President.
For those eight (8) years (1999 – 2007) of your tenure as NLC President, in a very difficult circumstances, you were able to provide the needed leadership to Nigerians to engage the garrison disposition of the Obasanjo administration with its anti-people policy credentials that often only corruptly enrich many PDP leaders. Notwithstanding outright Federal Government sponsored hostility, regularly followed by attempted inducement of union leaders, it was to your credit that you were able to keep union leaders in the country united. In addition, to sustain a united front, you were also able to ensure that emerging leadership disputes in affiliate unions were addressed and resolved promptly. There were many of such cases, which included the cases of Maritime (MWUN), Banks (NUBIFIE), Local Government (NULGE), Chemical (NUCFLANMPE), Construction (NUCECFWW) Unions among many others. It was to your leadership credit as NLC President, even when many of the leadership disputes in these unions threatened their corporate existence, they were never allowed to degenerate to the point of either factionalising the unions or NLC.
Sir, many people may not know your capacity in wielding a united leadership through very difficult negotiations. Often, politicians tend to argue that politics is different. But you have demonstrated that it is also possible for politics to be played in a conventional way that permits deployment of those negotiating and mediating skills. With pride, I can recall how in 2016, you were able to manage the transition in Edo that saw the emergence of Governor Obaseki as your successor whereby after some bitter internal contests for the Governorship ticket of APC, involving eight (8) aspirants, you were able to unite all the aspirants to support the victory of Governor Obaseki in the 2016 Edo elections. That was very exemplary and exceptional, and perhaps could be one of the factors that made many APC leaders, including President Buhari to invite you to serve as APC National Chairman.
Deducing from that, one would argue that the expectation of many is that you would be able to deploy those personal skills and attributes in managing the party. Since your emergence as National Chairman, have you been able to do that? Sincerely sir, I don’t want to judge you. However, my instinct is to forward to you a copy of your declaration speech APC: REPOSITIONING OUR PARTY FOR A UNITED NIGERIA, which you presented to APC members and supporters on May 10, 2018 at Transcorp Hilton, Abuja and invite you to objectively and honestly review it. Out of all the issues, I will kindly appeal to you to just confirm to yourself which of them could you verify that progress is being made satisfactorily.
Above all, sir, can we in all honesty justify why Chief John Odigie-Oyegun had to be asked to vacate the leadership of the party on accounts of your management records of the party’s affairs between June 2018 and now? Some pointers may be helpful in this respect. Many of us who are members of the party could not understand why it took more than two years after winning the 2015 election for Chief Oyegun to convene meeting of organs of the party, notably, National Executive Committee (NEC) and National Caucus. Today, more than four months after winning the 2019 elections and almost one year after the last NEC meeting on August 30, 2018, no sign of any meeting in sight. The only organ that is meeting is the NWC.
As a loyal party member, I have difficulty reconciling the absence of meetings of superior organs given all the challenges the party is going through, warranting the suspension of three serving governors (two of them now Senators) and two members of NWC. We had challenges that deprived our party the opportunity to contest 2019 election in Rivers, stripped our party of electoral victory in Zamfara, engendered highest levels of leadership animosities in Imo, Ogun, Adamawa, Bauchi, Kano, Ondo, Oyo, etc. Today, with Kogi and Edo elections approaching, similar leadership animosities are defining political life of the party in those states. My distant observation is that there is hardly any different between your approach in managing the party and the way Chief Oyegun had managed it during his tenure. Instead, things have really got worse and painfully, it would appear, you are in denial of this reality.
Perhaps, one need to ask, why was it impossible to replicate the Edo 2016 model of leadership reconciliation to facilitate some minimum reconciliation in Rivers, Zamfara, Bauchi, Adamawa, Ondo, Oyo, etc.? What happened to those your excellent negotiation and mediation skills, which always become active at very critical moment of your leadership. Imaging between 1999 and 2007, an affiliate of the NLC or a State Council being technically disqualified from participating in a national strike. I can bet my life that you will do all you can to prevent that from happening. You will never give excuses. The cases of the APC being unable to contest the election in Rivers and stripped of electoral victory in Zamfara state is antithetical to the brand of leadership you represent.
What is it that can be done now given all that has happened? Sir, there is the need to urgently refocus our party and all our leaders on the most critical political issue in the country, which is about reconciling our leaders at all levels. This is urgently needed in order to recreate the electoral advantage of our party. It is an advantage, which will keep diminishing once our leaders continue to grandstand and take positions with reference to technicalities. Grandstanding with reference to technicalities is the trade mark of Nigerian lawyers, with due apologies, which has produced the reality whereby the capacity of our legal and judicial systems to deliver justice are weak. Once our reference point is some of those technical details, which rationalises where we are, the tendency is that all proposals will be reduced to conquest scenarios, which may only deepen and create new conflicts.
Sir, any day, anytime, I will always argue that if there is any one leader that can produce negotiated settlement of all the leadership challenges we have as a party, you will be that one leader. It is a painful reality that we have found ourselves in situation of near stalemate in many states under your leadership. Embarrassingly, our leaders, including your very self, appear to be stubbornly inconsiderate of other options of resolving these challenges. If the electoral loss of Oyo, Imo, Zamfara, Adamawa and Bauchi are not a wakeup call to the dangers that lie ahead, what could have been? Is it that our leaders are indifferent to the possible return of PDP even when it is clear to any discerning mind that today’s PDP is a caricature of 2015 PDP?
At this point, I will still appeal to you to reconsider your strategy and remember how much progress we made in our struggle for democratic governance in Nigeria. In all my years of association with you, I never imagine that one day you will be so comfortable as to be indifferent to challenges that could threaten our national democratic development. You may be angry why I have to resort to writing you, but I have very little option. Unlike many of our leaders, I am confident that you are one person that knows very well that my interest is the democratic development of Nigeria. I am not seeking to engage you based on any personal demand but based on those same old commitments of engaging our leaders to consider proposals for our national development, which you have always encouraged.
May God guide you and all our APC leaders to initiate processes of internal reconciliation in the APC! Amin.
.
Salihu Moh. Lukman
CC: Progressive Governors.
Salisu Lukman is Director General of the Progressives Governor’s Forum.
He recently released a book titled .POWER OF POSSIBILITY AND POLITICS OF CHANGE IN NIGERIA which chronicles the various collaborative efforts of diverse groups that led to the birth of APC.