2023: APC chieftain decries continuous stay in office of Amaechi, Malami, others

An All Progressives Congress chieftain in Kaduna state, Malam Yusuf Ali, has decried the continuous stay in office by ministers seeking to contest for various elective offices come 2023, noting that it is unethical and immoral.

Section 84 (12) of the Electoral Act 2022 reads: “No political appointee at any level shall be a voting delegate or be voted for at the convention or congress of any political party for the purpose of the nomination of candidates for any election.”

President Muhammadu Buhari had, while signing the electoral act amendment bill into law on February 25, asked the national assembly to delete the clause on the basis that it will “disenfranchise” political appointees.

Going by the provisions of the new Electoral Amendment Act and the date for APC national convention as well as the scheduled dates for the 2023 general election, political appointees like Rotimi Amaechi, Minister of Transportation; Abubakar Malami, Minister of Justice; Chris Ngige, Minister of Labour; Emeka Nwajiuba, Minister of State for Education, Festus Keyamo, Minister of State for Labour among others, who are reportedly nursing presidential and governorship ambitions may be forced to resign their positions any time soon.

Speaking in an interaction with journalists in Kaduna, Ali said the honourable thing was for them to resign and pursue their political ambitions, as they don’t need any presidential directive or court judgment to resign.

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He said their continuous stay in office was a liability to the government and party, adding that it will be difficult to convince Nigerians that those Ministers are not using public funds to pursue their political ambitions.

“I am aware that some of Buhari’s ministers have ambitions to contest for an office. In fact, some have even openly declared their interest to contest for elective positions, yet they are pretending to be unaware of the moral burden on them to resign and prosecute their campaigns. Hiding behind the court judgement on the provision in the Electoral Act for them to resign before the party convention is not enough.

“During Jonathan’s administration seven ministers tendered their resignation months to the PDP’s primaries to contest for various offices. At the moment some of them are distracted already and government functions that have to do with the security and welfare of citizens are suffering.

“Take the issue of the Transport Minister, who has literally turned himself into the Minister of Railways, we need someone who can concentrate on supervising the operations and construction of the rail lines without any distraction at least up to the end of the Buhari administration. In another clime, he could have even resigned without prompting because of his failure to ensure security of the rail lines, which caused calamity to many families as I am talking now.

“While Nigerian students are languishing at home because of the protracted strike by Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), the man in charge of negotiating to ensure that the strike is called off is busy consulting across the country to run for office. This is immoral and we should not continue to run our country like this. There has to be an irreducible minimum we should not cross,” he said.