LAGOS JULY 3RD (URHOBOTODAY)-Reports coming in indicate that Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Chief Adebisi Akande are both absent at the ongoing National Executive Committee meeting of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in Abuja.
The meeting of the National Executive Council (NEC) of the All Progressives Congress (APC) got underway this morning with President, Muhammadu Buhari cautioning leaders of the party against getting involved in unnecessary in- fighting that might cost it the hard-earned victory.
Conspicuously absent at the opening of meeting were the leaders of the party from the South-west, including the former Lagos state governor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, pioneer interim national Chairman of APC, Chief Bisi Akande and the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbanjo.
Tinubu and Akande have not hidden their dissatisfaction with the national assembly leadership election held on June 9. The elections eventually plunged the party into crisis, eliciting verbal attacks and cold war amongst leaders of the party.
Early this week, Akande wrote a controversial open letter where he alleged a conspiracy of the north against the south west, warning that the party may lose future elections if the crisis was not nipped in the bud. The letter has generated reactions within and outside the party.
Addressing the NEC meeting and apparently speaking from his heart, Buhari said the party may have won the battle but risk losing the war if the current squabbles were not urgently arrested.
He urged his party men,’particularly those embroiled in the crisis, to drop their personal ambition and selfish interests and join hands with one another to address the daunting task of delivering on the promises made to the people.
The President also harped on the need to respect the supremacy of the party through which the elected politicians got their mandate.
The meeting is the first since the landslide victory of the party in the last general elections that brought it to power, both at the center and in 22 out of 36 States of the federation.
The party had been enmeshed in crisis following the national assembly leadership election on June 9. And every move by the national leadership of the party to resolve the crisis had apparently failed, hence the NEC meeting.