National leader of the All Progressives Congress and former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and former interim National Chairman of the party, Chied Bisi Akande, were notable absentees in the Friday National Executive Committee meeting of the party in Abuja.
Though not much has been heard from Tinubu himself about the festering crisis in the party, reports indicate that the man whose contribution to the emergence of Muhammadu Buhari as president of Nigeria is unquantifiable is said to be very bitter.
Akande, who is the right-hand man of Tinubu a few days ago vented his frustration, when he described what is happening in the party as a conspiracy against the South West.
Both leaders of the party have apparently not hiden their dissatisfaction with the national assembly leadership election held on June 9, in which the candidates anointed by the party’s leadership were roundly beaten.
The election was seen as a revolt against Tinubu who had established iron grip on the leadership of the party and had planned to extend his empire to the National Assembly.
The party’s NEC met to seek solution to the crisis rocking the party since the election of Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives, during which Bukola Saraki and Yakubu Dogara were elected to the two offices respectively, against the wish of the party.
The situation was apparently compounded when the attempt by the party’s leadership to have thier preferred nominees for the remaining principal offices was rebuffed by both the Senate President and the Speaker House of Representatives.
The crisis has polarised the APC, with a faction supporting Messrs Saraki and Dogara, and another backing the party’s leadership and Messrs.
Although the party’s spokesman, Lai Mohammed, tried to explain the absence of the duo on the fact that invitation was not extended to them, the fact that Tinubu’s identification card was sighted by reporters at the venue gives a lie to that explanation.
According to Mohammed, invitations to the meeting was at the behest of the national working committee of the APC, or its executive committee.
He said both Tinu and Akande were not members of the party’s exco, as such, it was the discretion of the APC working committee to decide who to invite.
However, he was unable to explain when confronted with the fact Tinubu’s that identification tag had been seen at the venue of the meeting.
