Consensus Building: Buhari Treats APC Stakeholders To Dinner

• It’s all suspense for party men, aides

BY EDMOND ODOK – Determined to build confidence and reach consensus ahead of the All Progressives Congress (APC) National convention and primary kicking off today, President Muhammadu Buhari on Sunday night further engaged key stakeholders of the ruling party on the way forward.

Treating them to a dinner at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja, President Buhari said as the ruling party, APC needs “unity of purpose, strategic alignment, consultation, fairness, determination and effective leadership” to achieve electoral victory as was the case in 2015 and 2019.

According to an insider, the President continues to insist that stakeholders and all party members must remember that on both occasions, “national and party interests were overriding factors in our deliberations and decision-making” in ensuring the party triumphed at the polls.

The insider said the meeting, which is a follow up to the one with APC National leadership and presidential aspirants on Saturday night, had the President seriously harping on consensus as the most viable option to adopt.

“He said given that all the aspirants are eminently qualified to lead the country, the Screening Committee’s proposal on consensus building through wider and intensified consultations among stakeholders must not be taken for granted”, the source submitted.

Attendance at the dinner included Vice President Yemi Osinbajo; the National Assembly leadership, President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila as well as other chieftains of the ruling party.

Meanwhile, amid the media throwing up some aspirants’ name as the preferred standard bearer, President has continued to keep everything still under wraps unlike the position he took on Senator Abdullahi Adamu’s emergence as the party’s National Chairman before the convention.

For now, suspense reigns among the President’s aides, loyalists and party’s stakeholders over who would be the ‘Chosen One’ to carry the APC flag in the 2023 presidential elections.

“All the names people being mentioned and bandied about are mere guess work. As usual, the President’s body language has not betrayed anything about his preferred candidate”, our very competence source volunteered.