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From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
The crisis rocking the African Democratic Congress (ADC) has taken a fresh turn, with Lere Olayinka accusing former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and his political associates of taking over the party through what he described as a defective leadership transition.
Olayinka, in a statement reacting to Thursday’s Federal High Court judgment which sacked the David Mark-led leadership of the ADC and nullified Atiku’s 2027 presidential ticket, alleged that the former Vice-President’s camp failed to follow the party’s constitutional provisions when it assumed control of the opposition party.
He accused the group of relying on the resignation of the party’s former National Chairman, Ralph Nwosu, to install a caretaker committee led by former Senate President David Mark, rather than securing the resignation of the entire National Working Committee.
Questioning the legality of the process, Olayinka asked why a former national chairman who had resigned would still have the authority to constitute a caretaker committee.
He argued that the party’s constitution should have determined who would assume leadership following Nwosu’s resignation, particularly whether the Deputy National Chairman should have taken over pending the emergence of a substantive chairman.
According to him, the political group should have secured the support of the entire National Working Committee, rather than relying on the former chairman alone to facilitate the leadership transition.
“In their desperation and political foolishness, they bought a party through the Back Door,” he alleged.
Olayinka further accused Nwosu of misleading the group into believing it had secured a legitimate takeover of the party.
“The National Chairman did them GBAJUE (419), handed over a FAKE PARTY to them, and moved,” he said.
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He maintained that the warning about the legality of the takeover had been raised earlier but was dismissed by those involved.
The statement comes against the backdrop of Thursday’s judgment by Justice Peter Lifu of the Federal High Court in Abuja, which declared the Mark-led caretaker committee illegal and nullified the actions taken by the leadership, including the process that produced Atiku as the ADC’s presidential candidate for the 2027 general election.
The suit was instituted by Nafiu Bala Gombe, a former Deputy National Chairman of the ADC, who argued that he was constitutionally entitled to assume the party’s leadership following Nwosu’s resignation.
The court upheld his case, dealing a major setback to the Mark-led faction and Atiku’s presidential ambition on the ADC platform.
The ADC has, however, indicated its intention to challenge the judgment at the appellate court.
Olayinka, while dismissing suggestions that the judiciary was responsible for the party’s predicament, insisted that the legal challenge arose from the manner in which its leadership was constituted.
He said the outcome would have remained the same even if the matter had been determined by what he sarcastically described as “Baba Oyin Adejobi of Kootu Asipa”, rather than a regular court.
The latest development has further intensified the controversy surrounding the ADC’s leadership and its preparedness for the 2027 general election.
