Oyegun formally withdraws from APC chairmanship race

John Odigie Oyegun

Chief John Odigie-Oyegun,

Chief John Odigie Oyegun, national chairman of APC

By Our Reporter

National chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief John Odigie-Oyegun has formally withdrawn from the party’s chairmanship race coming up later this month in Abuja.

Oyegun told a group of journalists at his residence Friday night that he had decided not to seek re-election during the party national congress.

“I do not intend to be part of the problem for APC to solve. It is for this reason that I hereby declare that I will not be seeking reelection as the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, APC,” he said.

“However, I will continue to perform my functions as the national chairman of the party till my tenure officially ends on Monday the 25th June when a new set of party executives will be inaugurated.”

“Even though I had the desire to re-contest as National Chairman of the Party, I have decided that it is ultimately in the best interest of the Party for me to withdraw from the race.”

He said that the national executive committee (NEC) of the party initially extended the tenure of the party executives so that the APC could go into the 2019 elections united.

“With the 2019 general election looming in the horizon, some of us considered it to be in the best interest of the party to go into the elections as a united fighting force, rather than one that was potentially weakened by internal conflicts arising from competitive congresses and convention,” Oyegun said.

“It was for this reason that we canvassed and obtained the NEC decision of February 27, asking all executives of the party to continue in acting capacities for another period of 12 months.

“If this decision was sustained, we probably would have achieved our objective. But we would only have succeeded also in postponing the evil days as it were. In retrospect, I am inclined to agree with the viewpoint that even a young political party as ours need to be subjected to the crucible of these contestations, which in any case, is the hallmark of progressive politics.

“In the end, even as difficult as the situation may appear at the beginning, the experience we would draw from managing the contending interests, can only hope to make our party stronger and more resilient.”

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