National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has given reasons why the party did not clear Minister of Women Affairs Aisha Alhassan to contest in the governorship primaries in Taraba state, Punch reports.
The party had disqualified Alhassan and her communications ministry counterpart Adebayo Shittu during its screening.
Shittu, the party had said, was disqualified for not participating in the mandatory National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme.
He had gotten into politics immediately after graduating from university and was elected state lawmaker afterwards. Shittu had said his duties as a lawmaker constituted his service to the country.
On why Alhassan was disqualified, Oshiomhole said:
As for the Honourable Minister of Women Affairs, she has issues that have to do with party loyalty. Our constitution is clear and it dictates that to contest elections or even hold office in the APC, you must be loyal to the party in every material concern.
From all she had said in the past and even her comments and general attitude during the screening, the NWC reviewed everything taken together and we arrived at the conclusion that she does not possess the level of loyalty that the APC requires for her to contest elections on our platform.
We made it clear when the defections happened that the APC may well benefit from these defections if it helps us to be more critical in terms of whom we give platform to contest elections and that there are core values that binds the APC together and they are non-negotiable.
The Electoral Act and the APC constitution forbid anyone from being a member of more than one political party at a time. You cannot be a member of APC and be a card carrying member of another party but when you have a situation where it would appear, based on what you know and based on what I know that someone is probably APC in the day time maybe for the purpose of retaining certain offices and they are PDP at heart.
Alhassan was recorded on video last year, telling former vice president and presidential aspirant Atiku Abubakar that her loyalty was with him even if he’s contesting against her principal, Muhammadu Buhari.
Abubakar later dumped the ruling APC for the PDP this year.