Friday Olokor, Abuja
With less than one year to the 2023 general election, a fresh crisis appears to have engulfed the National Rescue Movement, as northern politicians leave the party over alleged marginalisation from their southern counterparts.
The northern politicians were said to have alleged that they were not carried along in the decision-making process of the party.
The Deputy National Chairman of the NRM, Abubakar Jikamshi, raised the issues during a press conference in Abuja, where he announced his defection.
According to him, majority of the National Working Committee members were from the South-East.
Jikamshi, a former candidate in the 2019 Katsina state governorship election, noted that the party’s convention and primary held in March and June respectively, produced both the National Chairman, Isaac Udeh and its presidential candidate, Okwudili Nwa-Anyajike from the South-East zone.
He said the development has automatically portrayed the party as undemocratic.
Jikamshi told journalists that most of the national officers from the northern zones had left the party, adding that they are making consultations on the next line of action.
He said, “I was one of the founding members of this party and we were more than 50 in number, but as of today, before I announced my resignation, only three of us were still in the party as the rest had left due to the way the party was being run.
“My resolve to quit the party and the post of Deputy National Chairman was motivated by the glaring lack of democracy in the party, majority of the NWC members are from the same zone.
“The national chairman of the party is from South-East, same with the presidential candidate, Deputy National Secretary, Welfare and other officers who are all for same zone. They take decisions and just come and tell us on what they have decided on. The truth is all of us who came together to register the party have left.”
Jikamshi also alleged that some people were trying to use the NRM as money-making venture ahead of the 2023 polls.
He said, “The party is shopping for another presidential candidate as the present one is assumed not prepared to tow the line.
“It is rather unfortunate that this is happening under the view of the National Leader, who was the architect of the formation of the party.
“I want to call on the Independent National Electoral Commission to put search light on such small parties that are there as means of political prostitution and proscribe them as they don’t add any value to the polity of the nation.”
