FOLLOWING the recent position taken by the leadership of the Western Zone of the Association of Nigeria Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), the National President of the association, Chief Tony Iju Nwabunike has called on the members of the association to eschew bickering and embrace peace for the collective good of the association.
It will be recalled that the leadership of the Western Zone of ANLCA had in a communiqué issued recently, resolved not to recognise Chief Tony Iju Nwabunike as the National President of the association following his refusal to recognize Alhaji Taiwo Mustapha as the Chairman of the ANLCA Board of Trustees. The Zone had therefore resolved to recognize Mr Emenike Nwokeoji as ANLCA National President.
However, speaking in a telephone interview with TribuneOnline, Tony Iju Nwabunike said that as a father to all ANLCA members, he cannot support one group against another adding that “I don’t have to be a sectional President, I was voted by all of them and so I must respect every view of every stratum and every point.”
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The ANLCA National President stated further that, “I strongly believe that Mustapha and Henry Njoku who I consider as one of the best friends in the ANLCA Board should sit down and slug it out with each other to decide who the Chairman will be. It is a simple Mathematics. If they want me to come to anywhere they want to do that, I will be there as an observer and watch them. Remember that I won the highest number of votes in that Board. I was supposed to be the Chairman of that Board because of my highest number of votes but when I saw this problem coming, I nominated Mustapha then as the Coordinator which lasted for almost one year.
“So, Mustapha is my personal friend in that Board. We relate very closely just like Henry Njoku. So, what I am saying is that the two of them and other six Board members should sit down, elect a Chairman, I don’t’ know why it is too difficult for them to have an election even if the first election had been held and Mustapha is saying that he has the highest number of votes, let them do it in my presence or in the presence of NECOM or even me as an observer, then I endorse them. Whoever wins becomes automatically the Chairman of my Board.”
On the allegation that he witnessed the election of the Board that took place at the Golden Tulip Hotels in Lagos on the 13th of April, 2018, Nwabunike stated that: “God forbid, it is not true. That was the night of my inauguration. I wasn’t even at that meeting. If I had been in that meeting, I will endorse it. I wasn’t at that meeting at all. Whoever is saying it is lying, tell him to say it in my presence.”
Asked how he intends to manage the crisis since Mustapha faction was insisting that there was not going to be any other election of the Board as the election of 13th April 2018 stands, he replied, ”I will still beg them to come together because they are elders. Even if they have had election previously, I believe that whoever had the majority then will still have the majority if another election is conducted. Let them do this and allow peace to reign because for me, I strongly believe in peace and I know that peace will come. ANLCA shouldn’t be seen every day having problems all the time, most importantly whenever a non-Western candidate comes on board and we begin to have this problem. It doesn’t make sense, it looks like we begin to sectionalise the association which I think is not supposed to be.”
While acknowledging that he was aware of the gentleman agreement with the association that when a section of the association produces the National President, another section would produce the Chairman of the BoT which he said was for administrative harmony, he however recalled that Prince Olayiwola Shittu, a Yoruba man was the National President when he (Nwabunike) nominated Alhaji Taiwo Mustapha as the Board Coordinator, a position he held for close to one year and nobody raised an eyebrow.
He, therefore, advise concerned members of the National Executive Council (NEC) of the association to put their differences behind them and attend the NEC meeting scheduled to hold at Abuja on Monday in order to solve the problems together and take decisions where necessary. According to him, NEC is the highest decision making organ of the association.
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