…SAYS PERSONAL WEALTH NOT YARDSTICK IN BUHARI’S EMERGENCE AS CANDIDATE
A former Governor of Cross Rivers State, Mr Clement Ebri, has urged the leadership of the All Progressives Congress to reverse the outrageous cost of the party’s expression of interest and nomination forms.
Ebri, a Chieftain of the APC, said that the outrageous cost of the forms which has triggered outrage in the society contradicts the principle which inspired the victory of the Party at the polls in 2015.
The former Governor who made the comment in a statement on Thursday,argued that the party’s decision was creating the wrong impression that a citizen must belong to the club billionaires to aspire to be President.
Ebri was reacting to the Wednesday’s decision of the APC NEC to fix the expression of interest and nomination forms for the President and governor at N100 million and N50 million respectively.
“We should not give the impression that one must belong to the billionaires club to aspire to the highest political office in the land – the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We are and must remain a progressive and equal opportunity party.” He said
Ebri reminded the Party leadership that the APC came into power on the mantra to fight corruption insisting that the huge costs of the form s raises question marks on that position.
He wonders how aspirants are able to raise the funds to acquire the form and whether those purportedly sponsoring aspirants have evidence of their income through income tax returns.
“Let us not forget that the APC came to power inter alia, on the aegis of the promise to fight against corruption in the system, and the Nigerian people must continue to see us as accountable stewards of the mandate given to us.
“For a party that is fighting corruption therefore, the exorbitant cost of Expression of Interest and nomination forms raises a number of key questions, namely:
(a) How are those presently in government able to legitimately raise the required funds to qualify for the party’s presidential ticket nomination for example?
(b). If such candidates claim they are being sponsored by friends and backers, can those backers show evidence of their income via their income tax returns?
(c). What is the implication of this on the cost of running the actual campaigns?
(d). How many people can legitimately spend this much to obtain party nomination and still effectively be able to fund their campaigns?
(e). Will this not adversely affect voters perception of our great party, if we do not review our position?
(f). Are we justifying inflation by such a whopping increase in the cost of nomination forms from 2015 to 2023?
(g). Are we not inadvertently making the APC a party of wealthy by the wealthy for the wealthy?
“This last question has deep implications for a party that is in power and as custodian, necessarily has access to our common wealth.
“In the interest of the party therefore, I implore the National Working Committee (NWC) of our great party, to rethink the party’s position on this matter that is no doubt generating a lot of debate and controversy from within and without the party. “ he said
Ebri said that the high cost of the forms would deprive qualified aspirants without the enormous individual wealth from seeking nomination irrespective of their level of popularity.
He pointed out that personal wealth was never a parameter for the emergence of President Buhari as flag bearer of the APC in 2015 and 2019.
“If as some people may argue, that the reason for the exorbitant cost of nomination forms is simply to prune the number of contenders, or to delineate the pretenders from the contenders, then I think that argument is flawed.
“There are ample objective and progressive criteria such as: integrity, experience, character, political antecedents, empathy, intelligence, goodwill, etc, which can be employed to enable the emergence of genuinely qualified candidates.” He added
He stressed further that the current cost of the would make the youths, women and people living with disabilities who are aspiring to the highest positions more than their counterparts in the opposition.
“A comparative analysis of the APC’s cost of Expression of Interest and Nomination forms and that of the main opposition party shows that a member of the APC with gubernatorial aspirations will not only be spending more than twice what his/her counterparts in the opposition are, but will also be spending more to vie for gubernatorial office than the opposition candidates vying for the office of president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“Furthermore, as laudable as the concession of 50% reduction for youths (contestants under the age of 40 years) may seem, it is worthy of note that the youths in the APC that are vying for governorship will still be paying more than their opposition counterparts, and youths vying for the presidential ticket will equally be paying more than what the opposition presidential aspirants are paying to vie for nomination.
“The case of women and persons living with disability (PWD) is equally worrisome. Given the history of social and political exclusion of women and PWD, which the party has been in the vanguard of addressing, how many persons living with disability can afford to pay Thirty Million Naira (N30,000,000) as Expression of interest for the presidential ticket?”
