President Muhammadu Buhari Thursday maintained that despite he is being accused of aloofness and lack of grip in his party affairs, he is still the leader of the party.
He made veiled reference to remarks by some senior members of the party who have refused to recognise Buhari as leader of the party as it was during the days of ex-President’s Goodluck Jonathan, and Olusegun Obasanjo.
Top brass, and one of the leaders, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu had indicted the president for failing to get involved in the party’s affairs which has led to the current messy situation within the party’s caucus in the National Assembly.
According to Tinubu: “Despite the choice of National Assembly leaders being a mixture of party politics and legislative duty, the aloofness, or the perceived neutrality of the President allowed the ‘fight’ within APC to fester until it went of hand.”
APC Spokesman, Lai mohammed had also derided the president when he insisted that Buhari is not the party leader but ‘a product of the APC’, but that the leader is Tinubu.
He had said: ”President Muhammadu Buhari is not our leader, he is a product of the party. Tinubu is our leader.”
But on a ‘Channels TV’’s programme earlier today, the president maintained that he remained consistent in his belief that the legislature is independent and that would guide his approach to the leadership crisis.
The crisis in the National Assembly has been blamed on the APC’s seeming stance that they do not have an individual as their leader, who could drive the effort to unify the party in times of crisis.
But speaking for his boss, presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu disagreed.
“Does it need to be said? I don’t think it needs to be said that the President is the leader of his party. There’s no question about it,” Shehu said.
He added that there is need for Nigerians to understand the basics of politics as the country is no more in the military era when decrees are made by a single leader.
“Politics, as its theory says, is basically about contest for interests and these interests may be fully defined by political party programme (while) some of these things may be outside political party programme,” he said, adding that coming from different states there would be different needs influencing the interests every politician would promote.
He also noted that the lawmakers should be appreciated for allowing varying views. “They just cannot pile up in a single line and say ‘here we are, we are all present’.
“When the governors met with the President they told him that ‘we are the leaders in our states and we have influence over all of these senators. They come from our places and from us and we can handle it.”
He affirmed that if the governors are unable to resolve the matter then the President would wade in directly.
“The President has a responsibility to the party, the President has a responsibility to the nation and as far as we are looking at the situation it has not gotten out of control. It is still within manageable parameters, it is a little storm we will overcome and Nigerians better get used to it,” he said.

cc lalasticlala

APC Spokesman, Lai mohammed had also derided the president when he insisted that Buhari is not the party leader but ‘a product of the APC’, but that the leader is Tinubu.
He had said: ”President Muhammadu Buhari is not our leader, he is a product of the party. Tinubu is our leader.”

Zonacom:
All these sensational headlines these journalists use for there reportage is just uncalled for...

lanicky:
Hahaha! The drama is about to start

sweat4wat:
I don't have time for all this drama this wasn't the change they promised for Christ sake ooo aba