• APC Chairman distances self, labels announcers impersonators
• Development good for party, democracy, say ex-CoS, don

National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr Abdullahi Ganduje, has been suspended over alleged corrupt practices.

His suspension by kinsmen came a few weeks after the former governor was slammed with an eight-count charge bordering on corruption and misappropriation of public funds.

Announcing the decision at a press briefing yesterday, Legal Adviser of Ganduje Ward in Dawakin-Tofa Local Council of the state, Haladu Gwanjo, said the ex-governor remained suspended as a member of the ward until he exonerates himself.

He told journalists that executive members resolved to pass a vote of no confidence on the APC helmsman due to his “inability to clear his name from a wide range of allegations of corruption, particularly the celebrated dollar video.”

Gwanjo declared: “We, the leaders of the APC in Ganduje Ward, Dawakin Tofa Local Government, engaged in thorough deliberations, and subsequently decided to suspend the erstwhile Governor of Kano State, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, in light of the allegations of bribery involving foreign currency.

“It has come to our attention that Ganduje has been summoned to court to answer for these accusations, a development that we believe could potentially besmirch the reputation of our esteemed political party.”

BUT less than an hour after the announcement, the Abdullahi Abbas-led state chapter described the decision as an aberration and a clear breach of the party’s constitution.

He, therefore, suspended Gwanjo and his co-voyagers for six months.

His words: “We have evidences of meetings between state government officials and those that suspended the National Chairman, and the state working committee has agreed to sanction them for six months, and they stand for now suspended.”

The punishment followed the adoption of recommendations of the APC Dawakin Tofa Local Council chapter, chaired by Inusa Suleiman Dawanau.

Dawanau accused Gwanjo of working in cahoots with the opposition New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) administration in arriving at the decision to suspend Ganduje from the party in his ward.

He added that the participants had been found guilty of anti-party activities.
BESIDES, the ward chairman, Ahmed Mohammed Koko, insisted on being not aware of Ganduje’s suspension.

At a press conference yesterday evening, he declared that the Gwanjo-led ward members were impersonators, who could not claim to be leaders of the party at the ward level.

MEANWHILE, erstwhile Chief of Staff to the late ex-Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State, Prof. Gbade Ojo, and Head of Department of Political Science and International Relations, Lead City University, Prof. Akeem Amodu, have applauded Ganduje’s suspension.

Speaking with The Guardian in Ibadan, they both noted that his appointment as national chairman of the ruling party in the first place amid corruption allegations negated probity.

The two eggheads stated that the suspension ought to have come before now.

The scholars urged Ganduje to head for the court and clear his name.

Ojo, who is of the Political Science Department, University of Ilorin, said: “Ganduje’s suspension is a good omen for our nascent democracy. The suspended chairman has been under the radar for corruption. It is not good for the image of the party if he is the chairman and standing trial in court. The APC ought to have suspended him until he is cleared.

“He has to clear his name. Ab initio, his nomination as chairman of the party was wrong. If a security report prevented Nasir el-Rufai from being nominated as a minister, I did not see the reason  Ganduje was nominated as National Chairman of the ruling party.

“The APC did not do well to have nominated him when he has a corruption perception angling on his neck. Perhaps, he was nominated because he is their man. Now that the Government of Kano State has taken him to court, he has to clear his name. Ganduje may be on his way down politically. They are trying to take their pound of flesh. He needs to watch it because all politics is local.”

Amodu submitted that the suspension is good for our emerging democracy.

“I foresaw that a day like this would come. I am not surprised about it. The law must be allowed to take its course regardless of whose ox is gored. If the change is good, it is okay. We had an example when Dr. Doyin Okupe was in the Labour Party. He resigned because of corruption allegations. The suspension of Ganduje is good for the APC and our democracy.”