Only NWC Can Suspend Ganduje – Kana

The National Legal Adviser of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Abdulkarim Kana, has said that only the party’s National Working Committee (NWC) has the authority to suspend its National Chairman, Abdullahi Ganduje.

This statement was made during an interview with Channels Television’s Politics Today. His statement was made in response to the recent suspension of Ganduje, which was carried out by different factional executives in his ward and has sparked controversy.

Recall that Ganduje’s membership in the Ganduje ward was suspended by the two groups for suspected corruption, among other offences, during his term as Kano governor. 

However, the APC’s State Working Committee in Kano quickly overturned the suspension and imposed disciplinary measures on the ward executives. A Federal High Court in Kano also issued an ex parte order, temporarily delaying the suspension until the case is heard and decided.

A Kano State High Court judge who previously upheld Ganduje’s suspension has also reversed the judgement suspending the ex-Kano governor as APC’s National Chairman. Speaking about the development, Kana stated that no organ of the party has the authority to suspend any member other than the NWC.

He stated that the party’s constitution required that all procedures be followed before such action could be taken.

“All those procedures must be exhausted for such penalties to be imposed but as a penalty pending completion of an investigation, no organ of the APC has the power to suspend any member pending investigation except the national working committee,” he said.

 Those that suspended Ganduje was regarded as “random individuals”,  by Kana who said that they are not members of the ruling party.

He said, “I knew about some random individuals. They are not ward leaders of Ganduje ward and they are not ward leaders of anywhere then not what leaders are going to hear.

“That, we have established. And that was why, from the very beginning, when this information became known to us, the first thing we did was investigate and we’ll have a mechanism within the party to confirm when there are such claims.

“It’s a serious claim. That an organ of the party would take such a daring decision. We conducted our investigations and it didn’t take long for us to establish that the purported individuals who were said to have suspended the national chairman are not even members of the board committee of the party in Ganduje ward and are not members of any of the ward excos as we know.

“My office decided to go beyond just receiving reports from the respective organs as to the authenticity of the claim. We asked the state working committee to come along with the ward excos members to Abuja for us to interview them and we did and to our surprise, I insisted they should come with the identity cards and their voters cards.

“And when they came, we matched their faces against the ID cards and their names and we discovered that those who had appeared on television, making claims that those names belong to them were not and that is how serious this matter is.

“And that was why we did not waste time in bringing in the security operatives and the agencies to carry out investigations as to why those individuals would make such claims. They are imposters.

“That’s exactly what they are. And we also received a specific complaint, which was addressed to the police from the authentic ward excos of the party, and I think the matter is currently before the police for investigations.”