Jada delves into Adamawa ADC leadership imbroglio, identifies challenges with Arabi, Yohanna claims
Alhaji Umar Bello Jada also known as Calculate, who doubles as the Assistant National Organizing Secretary and the North East Zonal Organizing Secretary of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) in Nigeria, in this no holds barred interview dissected some of the teething challenges facing his party in Adamawa and other states of Nigeria.
Although Jada said he recognized the leadership of Shehu K. Yohanna as against the chairmanship of Mustapha Arabi, he nevertheless noted that both leaders are hobbled by legitimacy questions following the way and manner the party conducted its congresses in 2022 which is short of meeting INEC’s extant guidelines.
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He noted that the national secretariat of the party is not resting on its oars till all the inherent challenges are resolved as the party is poised to ensure that all grey areas in respect of non compliance with electoral guidelines are regularized ahead of 2027 noting that ADC will at the end emerged a strong force that will replace APC in 2027 general elections.
Excerpts:
Despite all the hoopla and rhetorics that your party the African Democratic Congress (ADC) will emerge a strong force ahead of 2027 general elections, the situation on ground is suggesting a different scenario following a seeming intractable leadership tussle between Shehu Yohanna and Mustapha Arabi splinter groups. Don’t you think this may stymie your chances in 2027 if allowed to fester especially against the backdrop of the controversial stakeholders meeting in which some leaders of the party were reportedly sidelined?
I will like to start by saying that there was no controversy around our last stakeholders meeting despite claims that invitation was not extended to some leaders particularly Shehu Yohanna. Three days to that meeting, an announcement and invitation was posted on the platform of the party which onboards all critical stakeholders of the party. I want to say clearly that Shehu Yohanna was an active member of that platform and must have been aware of the said meeting. But it is one thing to see the invitation and it is another thing to attend the meeting but saying that Yohanna was not invited was a huge misrepresentation of facts.
If national leaders of the party like former SGF, Babachir Lawal, myself, Bilyaminu and all the critical stakeholders are there, one should not come up with flimsy excuses of not attending the meeting.
Be that as it may, I want to say without equivocation that I recognized the leadership of Shehu Yohanna based on the correspondence of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and clear documentary evidence from the electoral body. I must also acknowledged that currently there are two splinter groups within the party who recognized the two people as leaders.
With the scenario you painted one will be right to say that the party is starting on a wrong footing. Can you elaborate on that?
The current leadership imbroglio will fizzle out very soon because the leadership is working assiduously to regularize some of the challenges it met on ground. I’m assuring you that our party will whether the storm and will form government at the national and sub-levels by the grace of God come 2017. Our commitment to make ADC the most viable and peoples oriented political party remained unwavering. We’ve array of dedicated, resilient, patriotic and committed leaders who will ensure the success of the party in all elections.
Can you tell us the genesis of the leadership tussle and how you intend to resolve it?
Before the resolve of the various stakeholders to adopt ADC as the coalition platform, the party was almost inconsequential, without much prospects. So the party like other small political parties was operated like a personal property with rules and regulations always observed in the breach. So the party was foundationally and structurally weak. When we came on board we were not abreast of some of the critical challenges dogging the party which is what bred the leadership crisis in many states now.
For instance, the Shehu Yohanna led leadership is being rejected by a section of the party stakeholders on account of non compliance with due process during the congresses of the party in 2022. INEC has in clear terms brought documentary evidence indicating that the Mustapha Arabi’s leadership did not meet the rigours of due process. After the departure of Arabi which paved way for the coming of Yohanna, the legitimacy issues still persisted and remained unresolved. INEC’s stand on Yohanna’s leadership was rooted on gross non compliance with electoral laws during the local government and ward congresses of 2022. It may interest you to know that out of the 21 local governments of Adamawa, INEC only endorsed the congresses of Yola North and Lamurde local governments. The same scenario played out in ward congresses as INEC faulted the process in 206 wards.
So these contentions gave rise to the leadership challenges we are facing today. But we are working towards the entrenchment of new exco in line with electoral laws of the land.
What led to the simmering altercation on the other hand has to do with a grave error of judgement on the part of the Shehu Yohanna leadership. What they ought to do when this coalition was birthed was to carry all members of the coalition in their strides and fill the vacant executive offices with members from the various blocks who came together to form the coalition. Have they done that, they would have doused tensions and it would have been doubtful if the legitimacy of their leadership would have come under intense scrutiny.
But in their move to have everything going for them, the leadership of the exco started replacing vacant executive spaces with their friends, colleagues, children and all manner of people. That is why the name of the exco of the party currently with INEC is different with the list sent to me by Yohanna.
The truth is that the only organs with the mandate and remit to endorse any state leadership structure is the national secretariat through the NEC or NWC of the party. But to our dismay, most of the vacant spaces were replaced unilaterally by the chairman without the endorsement or even imprimatur of the national secretariat.
Another error of judgement they committed has to do with the failure of the state leaders to extend hand of fellowship to the new members whose coming has made the party a force to reckon with at the national and sub-national levels.
For instance, the governorship candidate of the party only garnered about 2000 votes in 2023 election. But in juxtaposition, someone like Sen. AbdulAziz Nyako who brought the party to Adamawa State has over 140,000 votes in his kitty. In the same vein, former governor Muhammad Umaru Jibrilla Bindow also came with a strength of about 340,000 votes while Sen Aishatu Dahiru Binani came with a strength of over 400,000 votes. So it is a huge miscalculation on the part of the sitting leadership to refuse to accommodate the new comers in view of the tremendous goodwill they are bringing into the party.
Instead of accommodating the new members, the leadership developed a carefree attitude and adopted a posture which made their loyalty or commitment to the growth of the party suspicious. They ostensibly made the party a bargaining chip for us or against us showing that if they could not get what they want from us, they may auction the party to the APC or even PDP.
