Following President Muhammadu Buhari’s rejection of tenure elongation for the party’s executives, National Chairman John Oyegun refused to appear at a meeting with the House of Reps caucus slated for Wednesday.
The meeting, whose date was fixed March 15, was supposed to hold at 2 pm in a conference room on the House of Reps Wings of the National Assembly Complex.
House Leader Femi Gbajabiamila and others were already waiting to receive Speaker Yakubu Dogara.
The party secretariat advance team had also settled it waiting for the chairman.
A call, however, came through to Gbajabiamila from Oyegun, informing him the meeting was cancelled.
The chairman gave no firtger explanation or reason for the sudden cancellation.
But source close to Oyegun revealed that he was sommewhat disappointed at what happened Tuesday when Buhari suddenly tore down the tenure elongation decision.
The chairman was particularly gutted on learning about the reaction of party members across the nation.
“A message got to him (Oyegun) that some members celebrated the action of the President,” a source told the Punch.
APC National Leader Bola Tinubu was excited Buhari went against the decision.
The APC Edo chapter also hailed Buhari for doing the most constitutional thing.
All the celebration might have made Oyegun curled up when it was time for the scheduled meeting on Wednesday.
“His associates claimed that the chairman was not sure of the likely reception to receive from the lawmakers,” the source added.
The House Leader denied anything serious happened that breached the schedule meeting.
The party secretariat has yet to speak officially on that, either.
But what many Nigerians following the APC crisis know is that the internal wrangling is festering, and Oyegun’s naturally will feel betrayed by Buhari.
It is gathered that the president was at the National Working Committee meeting where the decision to extend Oyegun’s and other excos’ across the nation was made.
He had no objection then.
The president, however, said on Tuesday that his latest decision was based on the legal advice he sought from AGF Abubaker Makami who said the tenure elongation is against the party’s constitution and that of Federal Republic of Nigeria.
But the party’s legal adviser Muiz Banire said the APC constitution confer the powers to make that decsion on the NEC.
Banire, after the Tuesday meeting, said Buhari’s statement on the matter was sub-judice.
Ondo Gov. Rotimi Akeredolu also aligned with Banire.
Akeredolu, obviously, is loyal to Oyegun.
His governorship ambition could have died had Oyegun not intervened in such a way that the guber primary in 2015, whose outcome has become a legal issue, favoured Akeredolu.
Banire waded in then, intepreting the party consitution in favour of Akeredolu.
This which obviously angered Tinubu whose candidate Segun Abraham felt cheated, and challenged the primary in court.
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