•Lukman’s book launch at Shehu Yar’Adua Center in Abuja on Tuesday.
Senator Adams Oshiomhole, former national chairman of the APC, has given insight into the web of intrigues that led to his removal from office, accusing former governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, and his Ogun State counterpart, Senator Ibikunle Amosun of removing him as APC national chairman.
Senator Oshiomhole specifically spoke on his battle with the party’s governors and how some of them eventually ganged up to dethrone him.
The former chairman, spoke at the launch of a book “APC and Transition Politics”, authored by Salihu Lukman, a former national vice chairman (North-west) of the party, at the Shehu Yar’Adua Center in Abuja on Tuesday.
Mr Oshiomhole also did not spare the author of the book being launched, saying he alongside some governors spearheaded the campaign that led to his “illegal” removal from office.
He specifically fingered former governors of Ekiti and Ogun State, Kayode Fayemi and Ibikunle Amosun, respectively for instigating his removal. He alleged that the governors deployed all manner of illegal means to remove him following his moves to enshrine party supremacy.
“Lukman wrote several letters, dismissing my leadership without calling me. When you ride on the back of a tiger, there is only one destination. Lukman was appointed undemocratically by the governors’ forum. I was not consulted—I was a governor. We were told this is the new DG of the APC governors forum.
“Lukman was there when I wrote a letter, inviting the governors for a meeting to discuss the guidelines for conducting primaries, let me know the thinking of the various interest groups. I have discussed it with the president, and I needed to discuss it with the governors—so that once the guidelines are out, the party can claim ownership of it because it has been debated.
“I wrote to the governors for a meeting. The governors said no, I should come to Imo House, not the APC office. He (Lukman) was in the there (where they were holding the meeting). He did not see anything wrong with that,” Mr Oshiomhole said.
Speaking on the atmosphere at the meeting with the governors, Mr Oshiomhole said “It felt as though I was in a military barrack.”
He said following the diatribes from the governors, he responded “None of you can lecture me about the power of a governor. Because I have been governor twice. Eight years uninterrupted. At a point, I told Fayemi, ‘You did a resit. You were elected and by the second term, you lost. That means you failed’. I did not do a resit, and you are lecturing me about power. I can mention some of them.
“The man in Ogun State, he told me if not for the president, he would have left the party. Some of them told me “You are working for your paymaster in Lagos. Your paymaster in Bourdillon.
“I told the Ogun State governor, not the current one, the former one. I said “You are not loyal to President Muhammadu Buhari. Because if you are, when Buhari lost the election, you ported to the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) in search of a political greener pasture.
“You begged Asiwaju to beg Segun Osoba to accept you when you lost in the All Nigerian Peoples Party (ANPP). And today, you are coming to say that you are loyal, what manner of loyalty is that? This is what you call opportunism,” Oshiomhole said.
The former chairman also revealed that Buhari did not intervene to stop the onslaught from the governors.
He, therefore, warned Mr Ganduje to be prepared because, according to him, the governors are going to play the same card against him.
“Chairman sir, if you have not faced it already, you will face it. The only difference is if the president decides to intervene and moderate. In my own case, we have a president who was not ready to intervene,” he said.
According to him, the party gifted Kwara State N800 million to support the “O to ge” movement that led to the victory of the party in the state.
