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By Demola Akinyemi ,Ilorin 

The aggrieved members of the All Progressives Congress (APC)youths, ward and local government chairmen in Kwara state loyal to the Minister of Information and Culture, Alh Lai Mohammed yesterday sought divine intervention over the seemingly irreconcilable crisis in the state and also prayed for a good successor for President Muhammadu Buhari ahead of 2023.

Representatives of the ward, local government chairmen and youths Abdulrasheed Abdulrauf, Muyideen Shittu and Yinka Raji made the pleas in Ilorin, the state capital at a prayer session for the party ahead of 2023.

They also threatened that the seemingly irreconcilable crisis in the state could lead to mass defection of members to other parties and therefore urged the leadership of APC in the state and Abuja to urgently intervene and salvage the situation.

 They noted that the intervention became necessary and urgent because   the ongoing schism in the party portends grave danger for the fortune of the party in the 2023 and subsequent elections in the state.

Speaking on behalf of the ward chairmen, Abdulrauf said that “ I am delighted to present to you our elders and critical stakeholders our position, after carefully studying the situations in our party.

“We observe that since our party won the 2019 general elections in the state, there has been no peace in the party, following the desire of Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq to divide the party, which he successfully achieved by forming and funding a group called ‘AA”.

“This we believe, was not in the best interest of the party and not in line with the party’s constitution.

“We have lodged complaints several times with our various Local government party Chairmen, our senatorial chairmen as well as taking the complaints to the state chairman of the party against this illegality by the governor who is supposed to be the leader of the party.

“Despite our complaints, nothing has changed in the last 3 years. Therefore, we, the entire ward chairmen of the party in the state have met and resolved to call on the state chairman and our leaders to note that our teeming members and supporters at the grassroots are becoming restless, more so when election year is fast approaching.

“In conclusion, the house is falling and we hereby appeal to our Local Government and state leadership to take urgent measures to retain our members at the grassroots, otherwise, the horse will bolt out of the stable.”

Corroborating the above, Mr Shittu said that all the 16 local government chairmen “hereby acknowledge that the complaints lodged by the ward chairmen were not limited to their level alone, we Chairmen also suffer the same fate at our different local levels and we also registered same complaints with the state chairman without results so far.

Speaking for the youths Raji the youths “have found ourselves in the state since our party’s victory at the last general elections.

“Apart from the fact that we are not adequately carried along by the government-run by our party, the governor has been busy dividing the party and giving preference to mediocrity over and above merit both in the party and government.”

Responding the factional Chairman Hon Bashir Bolarinwa assured of transmitting their grievances to the right quarters.

 Said he: “We will take all your complaints to their doorsteps. We hope this time around they will listen to us. I have the feelings and I pray for them that Almighty God will open their eyes and make them realise that those of us in the APC loyal are the true members of the party in the state.

“If APC must make any meaningful impact in the state, then Abuja must listen to our pleas. They must look into our matter and they must do something positive.

“I hope they will listen because I am confident that definitely, they will not want to lose us.

“Having said that, I want to appeal to all of us once again and I want to tell us that by the grace of God we will have cause to laugh at the end of the day.

“Secondly, we have also prayed for President Muhammadu Buhari as the leader of our party as well as the number one man in Nigeria.

” There is no way our party can be talking of a successor without his important input. We asked God to guide and give him the required wisdom to be able to lead the party in choosing a good successor that will keep the flag of the party flying.