Unlike Buhari, I will not condone rebel ministers – Oshiomole
Chairman of the All Progressive Congress ( APC) Adams Oshiomole has vowed to expel the Minister of labour and productivity, Chris Ngige and the Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika from the party for failing to inaugurate the board of agencies under their ministries.
Oshiomole had asked Ngige and Sirika on the need to inaugurate all boards under their ministries within one week or face sanctions from the party.
In a letter dated July 11, 2018, the APC chairman berated the ministers for failing to reconstitute the boards, which according to to him, contravenes the position of APC’s National Executive Council and the presidential directives to all ministers, describing it as a great disrespect to the party.
Reacting, however, Senator Ngige said the board of the NSITF was not inaugurated because of corruption involving N48bn Federal Government and Employers’ contributions to the Employees’ Compensation Fund plus some non-remitted PAYE taxes.
But speaking to State House correspondents Monday, after a closed-door meeting with the Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, Oshiomole declared that the party under his leadership will no longer tolerate acts of disrespect from any minister, especially those who flout its directives.
According to him, some ministers had taken undue advantage of President Buhari ’s fatherly deposition saying if the President condones disrespect for his office, he (Oshiomole) was not ready to condone disrespect for the party.
“If the minister refuses, we will suspend him from the party. You know we must return to internal discipline. For me it is the height of mischief for any minister: you cannot purport to be a honourable minister and you act dishonourably and nobody is greater than the party.
“And if the President condones disrespect for his office, I will not condone disrespect for the party. And when we expel the minister we will prevail on the president that he can’t keep in his cabinet people who have neither respect for his own decisions nor have respect for the party without which they would not have been ministers.
“There are no independent candidate in our system. Nobody, I emphasise, no minister is above the party and they have taken undue advantage of the president’s fatherly disposition.
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