The APC Caretaker Committee Chairman and Governor of Yobe State, Mai Mala Buni, formally received a former presidential candidate on the platform of the People’s Trust, Mr. Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim, into the party when they met at the weekend, in Abuja. The duo met when Olawepo-Hashim led a delegation to the governor’s residence, where Buni thanked him and said the APC was delighted to attract a great leader like him into the party.

“You are not a new face to us; we respect you greatly. Do not see yourself as a new joiner in APC; you are equal now to everyone that came into APC from day one. All we have achieved is due to Almighty God and the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari,” he said. 

While thanking Olawepo-Hashim for all the contributions and your efforts in building the party in the FCT, North-Central and the country at large, Governor Buni added that the APC successfully registered over 40 million members in the last registration exercise with every member’s data, PVC numbers and passport photographs.

On his part, Olawepo-Hashim, in a statement released by his media office, yesterday, advised political leaders to utilise the internal machinery of the party to ventilate their opinions and resolve their differences instead of retreating to ethnic and religious conclaves to inflame passion and division.

He also urged leaders elected on the party platform to desist from using ethno religious platforms to ventilate their concerns on policy matters.

He recalled that it has never been the tradition in the politics of the country for leaders to be aggregating as Southern leaders or Northern leaders. According to him, Second Republic leaders spoke as UPN or NPN, PRP or NPP, GNPP or NAP or at best Progressives versus Conservatives.

“The divides were ideological, healthy and consistent with modern democratic practice. Now, we need to put a stop to politicking along regional lines, which is widening the gulf of divisions in the country,” he said. Mr Olawepo-Hashim also commended Buni and the caretaker committee for expanding the membership base of the party.

“His Excellency, we must commend your leadership style and your efforts that have attracted many to the APC.

In 1998 when I was privileged to be one of the youngest among great men and women that formed the then PDP, we used to take pride in the fact that we had formed the largest party in Africa.

But what you have done with the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari in the last one year has made the APC to exceed what we did then. Being big comes with its own challenges.  I pray God will give us the wisdom to handle it,” he added. In his own remarks, APC Chairman in the FCT, Alhaji  Abdulmalik, maintained that “since February 2021, when our leader, Mr Olawepo-Hashim did what experienced politicians do by registering in Usuma Ward, Bwari Area Council in FCT, he has contributed a lot with his teeming supporters.

“We are poised by the grace of God to win all elections in the FCT. He is a great mobiliser and loud voice for the unity of the country.”