It is with great pleasure that we are here today, your Excellency, on the occasion of this August visit in the month of December, to congratulate you on your recent victory in the presidential election, which outcome was also reaffirmed by the Supreme Court, the apex court of the land.
It is our strong belief that the successes that you recorded in your first term as President must be built on and sustained so that Nigerians will enjoy the dividends of democracy, which were not provided by the PDP in its 16 years of misrule.
Regardless of what your adversaries will say about your administration, a majority of Nigerians are happy that today you have stabilised our economy; our rail system is working again; the war against corruption is on and succeeding; Boko Haram has been technically degraded and defeated.
We are aware of the pockets of violence here and there in the North East, but those monitoring events across the country, even in Europe and America, know very well that even after defeating insurgents, it is common to witness pockets of violence and attacks on soft civilian targets.
Mr President, we are proud of what God has used you to achieve in this country and that was why Nigerians voted massively for you for a second term. Congratulations once again Mr President and congratulations to our great party, the APC.
Mr President Sir, as custodians of our party at the state level, we will not fail to use this opportunity to brief you on the happenings in our states and how they affect the party. We are proud that in the last general election, our party was able to maintain our lead in the number of states, increased our numbers in the National Assembly and, above all, ensured that our party enthroned a national Assembly leadership that would work harmoniously with the party.
While we celebrate these feats, we still believe that our party can do more. Your Excellency,
Sir, we listened carefully when you spoke at the last NEC meeting, when you charged our party members to make sure they dominated their units, wards and Local Governments.
We appeal to Your Excellency, Sir, to ensure that, as chairmen, we are given board and other appointments that will empower us minimally and help us to run the party in our various states.
We appeal to you, Sir, to ensure that true APC members are given appointments because there are some of the states where PDP members were given appointment to the detriment of our people. That does not encourage our people.
Mr President, Sir, let me also express our recent worries regarding the activities of some of the governors who are undermining the efforts of the National Chairman of our great party, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, to reposition the party by plotting his removal. It is more worrisome knowing full well that they are not doing this because the National Chairman is not performing his duties according to the constitution, but they are fighting him due to their 2023 presidential ambitions when it is a notorious fact that Mr President has just commenced his second term in office a few months ago.
Your Excellency, it may interest you to know, Sir, that because these governors were desperate in their bid to oust our national chairman, they even worked against our governorship candidates in Kogi and Bayelsa States so that we would lose and they would have latched on the losses as grounds to advocate for the removal of the national chairman.
It is really unfortunate, Your Excellency, that just after we won additional state in the South South, which is Bayelsa, consolidated on our hold on Kogi, these governors have been busy collecting signatures, spending our hard-earned resources in both covert and overt campaigns for the removal of Comrade Adams Oshiomhole.
We believe Sir that the affected governors don’t mean well for your administration because after Nigerians voted massively for Your Excellency, all hands should have been on deck to give Nigerians the desired dividends of democracy and not creating crisis where there is none.
On the watch of this National Working Committee (NWC) led by Comrade Adams Oshiomhole,
Mr President, our party ensured that true party leaders who would work in accordance with the visions and missions of Mr President were elected as leaders of the National Assembly.
Today, we are enjoying cordial relationship between the Executive and the Legislature and Nigerians are seeing the difference. These and many other achievements have been recorded under the Oshiomhole-led NWC. Therefore why will some people want to remove a winning team?
We want to appeal to Your Excellency to use your good office to call these governors to order so they will not destabilise the party. We need stability at this point and not anything that will cause distraction. And we use this opportunity to reiterate the Vote of Confidence, which we earlier passed in our National Chairman, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole and we appreciate Mr President for the cooperation that you have been giving to the NWC.
We thank you for granting us this audience and May the Almighty Allah bless you and bless your administration.
Long live APC!
Long live our President!
Long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria!
SIGNED:
HON. ALI BUKAR
Chairman of Chairmen