Salihu Lukman, a former National Vice Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has asserted that there is no significant difference between the ruling party and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
In an appearance on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, Lukman stated that the APC is now becoming worse than the PDP it aimed to replace.
He criticized the PDP for evolving into a one-man show where internal democracy was abandoned and candidates were imposed on the electorate. This, he emphasized, was the primary motivation behind the creation of the APC.
Lukman explained that the idea of merging opposition parties to form the APC was to defeat the PDP and address the anomalies that were prevalent at that time.
“We were clear on the kind of party APC should be. We saw the weaknesses of the PDP, apart from the imposition of candidates, part of the problem was that elected candidates were not accountable to the party or anybody and we thought building the APC would depart from that and that was where the slogan ‘change’ came from.
“When the debate about the manifesto of the party was going on, the conception was that the party was going to be social democratic with a priority on the issues of health, education and social services but the party has deviated,” Lukman said.
Lukman said part of the party’s problems started from Muhammadu Buhari’s administration, adding that the President was like an emperor because he was the singular electoral asset of the party.
“We were hoping with Asiwaju (President Bola Ahmed Tinubu), things will start changing,” he said, lamenting that things rather got worse.
“We are having a party where some of its organs have not been convened since its formation. We are having a party in which for one year no meeting has taken place and that party is controlling the government,” the APC chieftain lamented.
