SOME members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Taraba state have called for the arrest of the party’s former chairman, Ibrahim El’Sudi, for alleged impersonation. 

A new set of party leadership has also emerged as the intra-party crisis rocking the state chapter of the APC deepens. 

The party is currently divided into two factions, with one loyal to the APC governorship candidate, a senator, Emmanuel Bwacha, and the other to David Sabo Kente, a governorship aspirant.

Addressing journalists at the state capital, Jalingo, on Friday, April 28, the acting chairman, James Ahmadu, criticised the expulsion of Kente and the senator-elect for Taraba South senatorial district, David Jimkuta, by the chairman. 

Ahmadu said, “We are responding to the purported expulsion of David Kente and our senator-elect for Taraba South Senatorial district, David Jimkuta, by the former state chairman, Ibrahim El’Sudi.

“I and members of my state executive, as well as members of the APC in Taraba state, received the pronouncement with rude shock and utmost disappointment.”

Ahmadu described the move as illegal, noting that El’Sudi ceased to be the state chairman of APC in February. 

About three weeks before the 2023 elections commenced in February, 38 members of the State Executive Committee had passed a vote of no confidence on El’Sudi as the party chairman and allegedly removed him from office. 

The aggrieved executive committee members said El-Sudi’s dismissal as the party chairman was due to his failure to discharge his responsibilities, negligence, and misconduct.

But the party’s other faction, the Bwachi loyalists, opposed the move, saying “perpetrators of this unholy idea are in deep romance” with people outside the party. El’sudi also said he remained the chairman of the APC in Taraba.

Last Tuesday, the crisis took a dramatic turn when El’Suldi announced the expulsion of Kente and  David over alleged anti-party activities, and recommended their expulsion from the party to the national secretariat.

Ahmadu told journalists in Jalingo that sanctioning two prominent party members was an act of desperation from “a man acting the script of his paymasters.”

He said El’Sudi had been removed as the party chairman and was no longer in the capacity to eject or expel anyone.

He noted that as the then deputy chairman and highest-ranking official of the state executive, he was unanimously and legally endorsed as the state acting chairman of the party.

“By the provision of the APC constitution, El’Sudi ceased to function as chairman since February 10 and has no legal right to suspend or expel any member from the party.

“We find his actions in this sad development as an act of desperation from a drowning man who is acting the script of his paymasters. We also call on the national leadership of our great party to expediently call him to order before he creates confusion in the party,” he said.

Backstory

The current crisis in Taraba APC has links to when Bwacha became its candidate in the 2023 gubernatorial election.

Bwacha, who had been elected in the senate to represent Taraba South in the National Assembly on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2011, 2015 and 2019 general elections, defected to the APC in February 2022. 

Bwacha’s nomination attracted controversy as aspirants who participated in the primary election alleged irregularities.

Kente, a leading aspirant, rejected the results and approached the judiciary for an annulment.

The Federal High Court in Jalingo removed Bwacha as the APC’s governorship candidate in September 2022. The court held that the party did not conduct a primary that produced Bwacha as a governorship candidate.

The Supreme Court also upheld the judgment, nullifying Bwacha’s candidature. 

APC conducted a rerun in February 2023 and Bwacha re-emerged as the winner, although Kente and four other aspirants boycotted the election.

Displeased, Kente filed a contempt suit against the APC, INEC and Bwacha. He said they violated the court’s orders by conducting a rerun because the apex court never ordered it.

After the rerun, Bwacha proceeded as the APC guber candidate. However, he lost the election to Agbu Kefas, the candidate of the PDP.