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EVER since the emergence of the All Progressives Congress, APC, from the ashes of the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, the All Nigeria Peoples Party, ANPP, and the Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, in February 2013, its promoters have never hidden their ultimate goal of wresting power from the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in 2015. For this reason, they have gone about the self-imposed task by embarking on a bring-it-down campaign of not seeing anything good in the PDP government at the centre. At every given opportunity or forum, they are never tired of impressing upon Nigerians that the Goodluck Jonathan presidency is clueless and must be swept out of power in 2015 so that Nigeria can move forward. All seemed to have gone well for the APC initially especially as its emergence came at a time the PDP had a leadership crises under Bamanga Tukur, its then national chairman. This prompted some members of the PDP including five of its governors, to move in droves to the APC. Unfortunately, the party hierarchy was unable to manage the initial success and swell of its membership by allowing the defecting governors to take over its party structures in their states.

The party’s inability to manage the resultant leadership crises in Adamawa, Sokoto, Kano and Kwara States, encouraged some of its prominent members in those states, who felt short-changed or betrayed, to also move to the PDP. Apart from also gaining from the absence of internal democracy in the APC, the coming on board of Adamu Mua’zu as the national chairman of the PDP, changed the game. The PDP was able to put its house in order with a series of reconciliations at the state and national levels within a short time. Thereafter, it took the battle to the APC court. From all indications, it appears the APC is standing on shifting sand and its goal of sacking the PDP from power in 2015 seems far-fetched. This became evident in the June 21, governorship election in which Ayodele Fayose, candidate of the PDP, trounced Kayode Fayemi, the incumbent APC governor, of Ekiti State. Fearing that it could also lose Osun State in the August 9, governorship election, and by implication, its stranglehold of the South-West, the party became frenetic. That clearly showed in the desperate way it carried out its election campaign in Osun. Even though it won the election, the APC is now embarking on a desperate agenda which it hopes will see it through in 2015.

This is the subject of our cover story for this week entitled “APC’s Desperate Agenda,” put together by Olu Ojewale, the general editor. You may not have taken notice of some of the desperate acts of the party but we in Realnews do. That is what we have stringed together. Enjoy it.

Mike Akpan
Editor-in-Chief

mikeakpan2003@yahoo.com  |  08023880068

— Sep. 1, 2014 @ 01:00 GMT

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