Oshiomhole threatens to expel Ngige, Sirika from APC

THE National Chairman of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Adams  Oshiomhole has threatened to expel from the party, Minister of Labour and Employment and Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika, for their failure to inaugurate boards of parastatals under their ministries.

He said when expelled, they will be booted out of the federal cabinet as rebels as they will not have grounds to remain.

Speaking to State House correspondents in Abuja on Monday after a meeting with the Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari, he said if the president could condone the indiscipline of ministers, he as a party boss, he cannot condone their disrespect for the party.

Oshiomhole was reported to have written to the ministers on July 12, giving them a seven-day ultimatum within which to inaugurate all boards under their ministries or face the wrath of the party as according to him, their action was an affront to the position of the National Executive Council (NEC) and the subsequent presidential directives to all ministers.

Asked about the ultimatum in respect if Ngige, the former Edo state governor explained: “If the minister refuses, we will suspend him from the party. You know we must return to internal discipline. For me, it is the height of mischief for any minister. You cannot purport to be an honourable minister and you act dishonourably and nobody is greater than the party.

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“And if the President condones disrespect for his office, I will not condone disrespect for the party.

“And when we expel the minister, we will prevail on the president that he can’t keep in his cabinet people who have neither respect for his own decisions nor have respect for the party without which they would not have been ministers.

“There are no independent candidates in our system. Nobody, I emphasise, no minister is above the party and they have taken undue advantage of the president’s fatherly disposition.

“Now, it is the same green pen that made them ministers that appointed these boards that they are refusing to swear in. And it is absolutely illegal for a minister in a democracy to prey the powers of the board because the laws establishing those institutions are clear, that the boards have procedures to follow.

“So, when a minister sits in his office to appropriate the powers of the board in a democracy, not in a dictatorship, award contracts that didn’t go through boards, those are clearly an abuse of office for which they are liable.

“I am convinced that what they are doing is not with the endorsement of Mr. President. Over the period they have tried to drop the president’s name but I tell them it is the same authority that appoints these people.

“So, we are informing them that it is either they comply to the president’s instructions or they comply with the party’s position or they go and administer outside the government.

“We have respect for ministers but only to the extent that they recognize that they are a product of a political party and we are not negotiating that.

“If they did that in the past, under our leadership we will not tolerate it. They either comply or we will expel them from the party.

“When we expel them, we will find out how a government can keep a rebel in the cabinet. There is no question about that.”