From Romanus Ugwu, Enugu

For the All Progressives Congress (APC), year 2024, in every ramification, is a mixed bag of the good, the bad and the ugly.

On a positive note, the year could not have been better for the ruling party as it won the two off-cycle governorship elections in Ondo State where it consolidated its grip on the Alagbaka Government House and in Edo State where it muscled out the Godwin Obaseki-led ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from the Osadebe House.

Again, and more importantly, APC would not have asked for more this year with the multitude of heavyweight politicians joining the ruling party, in droves, from the opposition political parties. Many consider that as one of the major achievements of the party this year.

The joiners hypnotically came from the state chapters especially during the two off-cycle governorship elections while countless number of others defected from both chambers of the National Assembly.

Whether it was supressed or cautiously managed, there has been a relatively peaceful atmosphere within the party throughout the year. The leadership of the ruling party has been able to checkmate the internal crisis which usually was the albatross on its neck.

Crises actually reared their ugly heads in the party at almost all its state chapters, especially in Delta, Edo, Enugu, Adamawa, Bauchi, Benue, and more curiously in Rivers State, where two parallel leaderships emerged. But give it to the national leadership of the party as it was able to sagaciously curtail the intra-party conflicts from degenerating into a full-blown conflagration.

Expectedly, litigations and endless protests, particularly from the North Central stakeholders, clearly agitating the disruption of the zoning arrangements of the party, specifically concerning the position and status of its National Chairman, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, equally reared its ugly head. The leadership of the ruling party also was handy in curtailing the hostilities.

Protesters sponsored by sometimes faceless North Central APC stakeholders had on several occasions stormed the national secretariat of the party in Abuja and at many instances petitioned the party, including taking legal actions, to register their grievances over what they called usurpation of their right.

Again, the party’s leaders were able to surmount the insurrections and even won its case at the law court.

But many stakeholders were very critical of the national leadership of the party for violating its constitution in the failure to organise its National Executive Committee (NEC) and National Caucus quarterly statutory meetings all through this year. The leadership was undauntedly adamant in managing the situation, projecting one cogent and or flimsy reasons or the other like the unavailability of President Bola Tinubu to physically attend the meeting in defence of its action.

Again, and commendably, even the party’s harshest critics were in sync that the usual widening cracks always ravaging members of the national leadership of the party, the National Working Committee (NWC), was completely inconspicuous this time.

Even when tension heightened over the shoddy manners the primaries for both the Edo and Ondo State governorship elections were conducted, and threatening to tear the unity of the party apart, pitching the leadership and the stakeholders against each other, the prompt intervention of the presidency had quietened the troubling atmosphere.

For many political pundits, and equally in the perception of many of party chieftains, the year 2024 was so glorious to the ruling party that the members would not have asked for more in repositioning the APC more positively in the year ending.

In the perception of a founding member of the ruling party, Osita Okechukwu, APC, as a political party, recorded a high-grade pass mark in 2024, arguing that it is a fruitful and rewarding year for the party in terms of electoral success and fulfilment of its election campaign promises to Nigerians.

Appraising the year in a chat with Daily Sun, the former Director General of the Voice of Nigeria (VON) noted: “We won an additional State in Edo and retained Ondo in the two off-season gubernatorial elections. The two wins consolidated our great party’s supremacy, and it is no mean achievement.

“Secondly, the tough economic situation at the Federal Government level that was almost making us lose supporters nationwide seems to have ebbed with the Port Harcourt Refinery producing petroleum products to augment the Dangote Refinery.

“In the next few months when the refinery comes up in full stream, the fuel pump price will likely crash to below N1,000 per litre. This will lead to a crash in food prices and other essential commodities which escalated because of the increases in the fuel pump price.”

Still scoring his ruling party very high, Okechukwu emphasised that; “on the issue of insecurity, one is happy to report that President Tinubu has contributed immensely like Muhammadu Buhari, in adequately funding the security agencies, hence the drastic reduction in insecurity in the country.

“In summary, one can humbly submit that as we approach the 2027 general elections, the nay Sayers will most likely change their hostile rhetoric against our great party, the APC. We appreciate the truism that as an incumbent government, all the barbs are thrown to us, but in the months ahead the pains will be a story of yesterday’s.”

Corroborating Okechukwu’s views, Oliver Okpala, the Senior Special Assistant (SSA) on Public Enlightenment to the party’s National Chairman, Ganduje, gave a resounding pass mark to his boss and by extension the ruling party.

In an exclusive chat with Daily Sun recently, Okpara said: “Before Ganduje assumed office as the national chairman of the APC, there was crisis in the party. People were working at cross purposes at different directions, divergently, politically and otherwise.

“The lack of direction was why the former chairman resigned and created room for a dynamic leader like Ganduje to come in and give the party a sense of direction, ensure that the party is returned to the owners, the commoners, to ensure political unity and sense of direction.

“Realising the fact that there had been diversity and distractions in the past, Ganduje ensured that everybody in the party was brought back on board, making every member realise that he is a stakeholder in the party.

“Since he took over, there was no act of victimization or vendetta because he allowed the past and everything in the past to slide and continue on a clean slate with the future. By doing so, he ensured there was relative peace, unity, and harmony in the party.”

Extolling the virtues of the leadership of the party in ensuring that members of the NWC remained in the same wavelength instead of the usual crack, the SSA said that; “Ganduje made sure that all members of the NWC operated together as brothers and sisters under one platform.

“Having set in motion a peaceful agenda on the leadership of the party, he moved to different areas of the party, especially the state chapters, to ensure their functionality even at the local government.

“His dynamic approach to political matters, his political sagacity, and acumen came into proper play, and naturally, he was able to win elections in the states in a democratically, free, fair, and peaceful atmosphere. There was no bitterness or rancour at the end of it all.”

Not done in the narrative over the secret behind the relative peace within the party, Okpala, in his conclusion, noted: “It is not easy in Nigerian politics, but there has been peace in the party since Ganduje came on board. Everybody is working as a member of one indivisible family.

“As a father, he has ensured that all his children (party members) are taken care of adequately. The welfare of the staff and that of the stakeholders of the party has always been uppermost in his mind.”

However, on the flip side, APC, to many Nigerians, represents everything negative, this year, and a party pretending to be sympathetic to the suffering masses but in reality, may not have actually made much input in its own government during policy formulation, to ameliorate the hardship in the land.

Apart from its insensitivity over the agonising pains and hardship in the country, most critical observers are of the perception that the ruling party has been secretly conspiring with its chieftains and appointees to fuel the leadership crises rocking almost all the opposition parties throughout this year.

Coincidentally, the recent remarks by the APC national chairman, Ganduje, that the party would like to understudy the one-party system format practised in Vietnam, according to many observers, somehow gave out the party as the unseen force behind the crises in the opposition parties in its secret plans to perhaps turn Nigeria into a one-party state as well.

Speaking when he received Vietnamese Ambassador to Nigeria, His Excellency Bui Quoc Hung, who paid him a courtesy visit at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja, recently, Ganduje had emphasised that since the model works perfectly well in the country, “APC would want to study and possibly implement the model in Nigeria.”

Regardless of the efforts and pontificating of the leadership of the APC to endear itself to Nigerians, many still cling to the negative mantra that what the APC cannot destroy does not exist, considering the current deplorable state of the economy in the country.

One of the apostles of such perception and a very antagonist voice of the opposition, is the National Secretary of the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP), Peter Ameh.

In his critical assessment but damning verdict against the ruling party, Ameh claimed that APC’s inability to provide a clear vision for the country’s economic recovery has arguably exacerbated the situation many Nigerians are facing today.

Assessing the performances of the ruling party in a chat with the Daily Sun, Ameh noted that; “The APC’s 2024 scorecard is a disappointing one. The party’s lack of vision, leadership, and commitment to good governance has led to widespread suffering among Nigerians.”

He equally expanded his assessment of the performance of the APC-led administration during the year under review, describing it as a daunting task considering Nigeria’s economic downturn and doldrums.

According to him; “the country has faced significant economic challenges, including a struggling Naira, high inflation, and a lack of vision in addressing these issues. The APC’s handling of the economy has been criticized, particularly about the fuel subsidy removal.

“This decision has led to the cost-of-living crisis, with many Nigerians struggling to make ends meet. The party’s inability to provide a clear vision for the country’s economic recovery has further exacerbated the situation.

“One of the most significant challenges facing the APC is the issue of corruption. Despite promises to tackle corruption, the party has been criticized for its lack of progress in this area.

“The continued prevalence of corruption has undermined the government’s ability to deliver on its campaign promises and has contributed to the country’s economic woes. In terms of scorecard, it’s difficult to give the APC a pass grade.

“Lack of transparency, accountability, and good governance have marred the party’s performance. The economic downturn, coupled with the party’s inability to address the root causes of the crisis, has led to widespread suffering among Nigerians this year.

“The APC’s lack of vision and leadership has also been evident in its handling of the country’s security challenges. The continued prevalence of insecurity, particularly in the northern region, has led to widespread displacement and human suffering.”

However, if Ameh was mild in his assessment of the performance of the ruling party, APC’s former national vice chairman (North West), Salihu Lukman, was adamantly offensive and blunt in claiming that the party has been reduced to a mere legal entity, insisting that APC has lost its founding vision and failed to keep its campaign promises

“I admit that in terms of meeting up with our campaign promises, we have done badly, no doubt about it. Issues of security, issues of economy and issues of fighting corruption, we have done badly.

“From 2015, when PDP was defeated, there are no new initiatives that you can point out to say as a party that came to change the reality of our politics. We have promised to do things differently to meet the expectations of Nigerians. Instead, we have actually regressed, let’s be honest about it.”

The former Director General of APC Progressives Governors Forum (PGF) further lamented that; “as it is today, the party is only a legal entity. The function that it is supposed to exercise as a political party by way of aggregating interests and opinions has been sacrificed completely…frankly speaking; this is part of my pain.”

“Our vision is that it should represent a stronger capacity for governments elected to respond to the challenges and problems of the nation. Unfortunately, what we have is practically business as usual.”

A chieftain of the party, who craved anonymity in a chat with the Daily Sun, sarcastically claimed that the biggest achievement the ruling party recorded this year is perfecting the act of rigging elections, stressing; “I think that we have seamlessly perfected the code of winning elections judging by the feat we recorded in the off-cycle governorship elections in Edo and Ondo States.

“What the actions of our party mean is that it has positioned itself to secure victory in any election in every part of the country despite the hostilities from any quarter. Judging by the way the party is going, it may be pretty obvious that the 2027 presidential election has been won and lost even before the cast of any vote.”

Incidentally, Ameh, a former President of the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) did not end with his critical assessment but went further to advise the party and its government, stressing that; “to regain the trust of the Nigerian people, the APC must demonstrate a clear commitment to transparency, accountability, and good governance.

“To turn things around, the APC must demonstrate a clear commitment to good governance, transparency, and accountability. The party must also develop a comprehensive economic plan that addresses the root causes of the crisis, including the removal of the fuel subsidy.

“Furthermore, the APC must take concrete steps to tackle corruption and address the country’s security challenges. My other humble recommendation for APC in the year 2025 is that it should take concrete steps to tackle corruption, block leakages and ensure transparency and accountability in government.

“It should address the country’s security challenges, particularly in the Northern and Eastern regions of the country. Demonstrate a clear commitment to good governance and leadership. If APC commits to implementing these recommendations, it can begin to rebuild the trust of the Nigerian people and set the country on a path towards economic recovery and prosperity.”