We’ll Ensure Concord Between Arms Of Govt, Party, Osinbajo Says At APC Enlarged Tripartite Committee Meeting

REMARKS BY HIS EXCELLENCY, PROF. YEMI OSINBAJO, SAN, GCON, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA AT THE MEETING OF THE  EXPANDED TRIPARTITE CONSULTATIVE COMMITTEE OF THE EXECUTIVE, LEGISLATIVE AND APC LEADERSHIP AT THE BANQUET HALL, PRESIDENTIAL VILLA ON THE 9TH OF NOVEMBER, 2021 

PROTOCOLS 

It’s my pleasure to welcome you to this meeting which has, in addition to the usual members of the Tripartite Committee established by his Excellency, President Muhammadu Buhari, we also have representatives of the APC Governors as well as members of our Party in the National Assembly.

The Tripartite Committee as we know was conceived by his Excellency, the President, as a way of ensuring a cordial and beneficial relationship between the Executive, Legislative branches of the government on the one hand, and the Party on the other hand. 

The whole idea was to ensure that whenever there are issues that require deliberations, perhaps, thorny issues, we are able to discuss them as a Tripartite Committee before taking them any further. If there’s any issue to resolve at that time, we can simply resolve it and we can move on. 

We’ve had several meetings of the Tripartite Committee and many of these issues have been resolved to the benefit of our Party and to the benefit of our government. 

But at about a couple of meetings, about three previous meetings of the Tripartite Committee, the issue of the proposal first by the House of Representatives and then the Senate, to restrict the conduct of primaries of parties to only direct primaries came up. 

The reason as it emerged from our discussions at the Tripartite Committee was that some legislators felt that party congresses had been completely taken over by State Governments and other legislators and they, as stakeholders stood no chance of a fair contest in the primaries if all potential delegates and actors have already been spoken for. 

We then decided at the last meeting of the Tripartite Committee, (because these issues, problems, and sides were laid before us) to call an expanded meeting where the leadership of the National Assembly, Governors and all other stakeholders that are present here would be able to deliberate on those issues and hopefully find solutions that would be acceptable to all, but, most importantly, that would work in the interest of our Party especially as we go into the elections come 2023. 

Other speakers after me will elaborate further on the issue but I want to urge all present that in the course of our discussions today we should seek to find solutions highlighting the pathways to an amicable resolution. 

Most of us who are here are probably familiar with what the problems are, what we really want are solutions. If everybody takes time to speak again about all the issues and rehash everything, we won’t leave here. I really think that it’s important that we’re able to get quickly to the issues and resolve them in a way that would be satisfactory. 

I think at this period more than ever, we need peace and concord within our Party and I hope this meeting would mark a new beginning in that direction, and I hope at the conclusion of this meeting we’ll only have good things to report to Mr. President. 

Thank you all very much for taking the time to come.