Adams Oshiomhole
The crisis in the All Progressives Congress (APC) between some
governors of the party and its National Chairman, Comrade Adams
Oshiomhole, took another turn over the weekend as the Department of
State Services (DSS) reportedly detained and interrogated Oshimhole.
New Telegraph gathered yesterday that President Muhammadu Buhari,
who was not aware of the DSS’ action, has ordered an immediate probe of
the matter, while the party is said to be considering appropriate
sanctions against some of its governors accused of being behind the
plot.
In the past three weeks, Oshiomhole has been engaged in a war of
words with Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State and his Ogun State
counterpart, Governor Ibikunle Amosun.
The two governors have openly criticised the party chairman for
rejecting their anointed candidates, Uche Nwosu and Hon. Abdulkabir
Akinlade, to succeed them in Imo and Ogun states, respectively.
It was gathered yesterday that the two governors are seen as the masterminds of Oshiomhole’s ordeal.
The APC national chairman, an online newspaper, TheCable,
yesterday, reported, was grilled by DSS operatives for nine hours on
Sunday after some APC governors alleged that he received bribes during
the recently held primary elections of the party.
The paper further reported that Oshiomhole was asked to resign
during interrogation, but he resisted, saying he would only do so if he
loses the confidence of President Buhari, who was in the know of all
actions he took during the party’s primaries.
When contacted, National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Lanre
Issa-Onilu and spokesperson of the DSS, said they were not aware of the
arrest and quizzing of Oshiomhole.
However, a top aide to the APC national chairman, exclusively told
our correspondent that he (Oshiomhole) was quizzed by operatives of the
DSS.
“Yes, he was invited by the DSS, questioned and detained for
hours with the operatives asking him to resign his position as chairman
of the ruling party, which he objected to,” the source said.
He blamed Okorocha and Amosun for Oshiomhole’s ordeal, while
revealing that the APC national chairman, after conferring with
President Buhari on the matter, travelled out of the country on Tuesday.
According to the aide, the two governors are still embittered over
the outcome of the APC’s governorship primaries in which their preferred
aspirants lost. They had claimed that Oshiomhole used his position as
the national chairman of the party to shut out their anointed
candidates.
It would be recalled that the Oshiomhole-led APC National Working
Committee (NWC), at the weekend, submitted the name of Senator Hope
Uzodinma to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as the
governorship candidate of the party in Imo State as against Okorocha’s
son-in-law, Nwosu, while in Ogun State, it was Prince Dapo Abiodun as
against Akinlade, who is Amosun’s choice.
A party source, who further confirmed the claim by Oshiomhole’s
aide, told New Telegraph that the APC national chairman’s invitation by
the DSS on Sunday, shortly after he returned to Abuja from his village
in Edo State, was orchestrated by Okorocha and Amosun, acting in cahoots
with an APC governor from a Northern.
According to the source, the governors took the step after they
failed to mobilise the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the party
to pass a no confidence vote in Oshiomhole.
His words: “When the move for a no confidence vote failed, the
aggrieved governors decided to procure the services of the DSS to force
Oshiomhole to write and sign a letter of resignation, which would have
ended his chairmanship of the party.
“He was grilled for about six hours during which he was
confronted with unsubstantiated allegations that he collected bribes to
predetermine the outcomes of the recent APC’s primary elections. But,
Oshiomhole rebuffed the pressure by the DSS interrogators to make him
write his resignation letter.
“The former labour leader insisted that he would not acquiesce
in their request unless he had discussed with President Buhari, whose
name the DSS interrogators dropped in the course of the questioning. He
told the DSS interrogators point blank that he would rather die than to
cave in to their pressure for him to resign a position that the party
vested in him at the national convention.”
Besides Buhari, New Telegraph further learnt that Vice President
Yemi Osinbajo and the National Leader of the party, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu,
were also piqued by the action of Governors Okorocha and Amosun.
Sources close to them said they described their action as an affront to the presidency and the APC leadership.
It was also gathered that an APC governor of one of the North-West
states is mobilising other Northern governors to support Oshiomhole. The
move is said to be a response to the subtle threats by Okorocha and
Amosun to rock the boat of the party as well as to work against Buhari
in their respective states during the 2019 presidential election.
A former national vice chairman of the party, who said he heard of
Oshiomhole’s arrest, but couldn’t confirm it, warned the party’s
leadership against the danger of forcing the national chairman to resign
his position.
“This is trouble signal for the party because it is happening
at a time when everyone is running around to see how we can put our
house in order ahead of the election,” he said.
While efforts to get Amosun to react to the allegation was
unsuccessful last night as one of his media aides, who promised to get
back to our correspondent failed to do so, Chief Press Secretary to
Okorocha, Sam Onwuemedo, said the governor would respond to the claim at
the appropriate time.
The APC National Publicity Secretary, who denied arrest of
Oshiomhole by the DSS, told journalists at the party secretariat in
Abuja that the national chairman was in his office on Monday and Tuesday
before he travelled Tuesday evening.
He explained that Oshiomhole ought to have travelled before this
time, but severally postponed his travel because of the submission of
the party’s list of candidates for the general elections to INEC.
“The party is not aware of any arrest and quizzing of its
national chairman. He was in office on Monday and Tuesday before he
travelled on Tuesday evening. We wait to hear from the National Chairman
on the report, but as I speak to you, no such report of his arrest and
grill is before us,” Issa-Onilu.
DSS Public Relations Officer, Mr. Peter Nnochiri, who also denied
knowledge of Oshiomhole’s arrest, in a terse reply to a text message
requesting the official position of the agency on the matter, said: “I’m
not aware of this.”
Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described as
reprehensible, revelations that the Buhari presidency is concealing
alleged bribery and corrupt practices involving the APC national
chairman.
The party, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola
Ologbondiyan, said it was privy to the pressure on the DSS to let
Oshiomhole off the hook for fears that his investigation would unearth
the complicity of the presidency and other key members of the APC in the
scam.
PDP said: “Information available to the PDP reveal that apart
from the billions of naira he allegedly stole from the coffers of Edo
State when he was governor, Oshiomhole is facing charges of allegedly
collecting billions of naira bribe from some ministers and other APC
sources in Adamawa, Rivers, Kano and Imo states to manipulate the 2019
electoral process.
“This is in addition to allegedly collecting billions of naira
from presidency sources to influence electoral officers, independent
observers and certain polling organisations ahead of the 2019 election,
part of which was allegedly diverted for personal use of some APC
leaders.
“The PDP had always alerted Nigerians of the corruption
allegation burden on the APC chairman and the continued official cover
provided for him by the Buhari presidency, including stalling his
investigation and prosecution by the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission (EFCC) over alleged stealing of billions of naira from Edo
State coffers.
“If the Buhari presidency has nothing to hide; if it is not
complicit in the alleged scam, it should allow the DSS and EFCC a free
hand to investigate and prosecute his party’s factional chairman, Adams
Oshiomhole, particularly now that all issues are laid bare before
Nigerians.
“As long as the DSS and the EFCC are not allowed to put
Oshiomhole into the dock, the Buhari presidency does not have the moral
rectitude to speak on corruption. This is especially as the involvement
of the DSS shows that the corruption burden of the APC chairman has
already become a security risk for our nation.
“Finally, the PDP cautions that under no circumstance should
the presidency escort Adams Oshiomhole out of the country, just like it
did for the disgraced Buhari’s former Minister of Finance.”