Leadership Tussle: IPAC Lambasts Ex-chairman For Heading To Court

The Inter Party Advisory Council (IPAC) has berated the former national chairman of the organisation Engr Yabagi Sani for taking the new leadership of the body to court after initially congratulating its emergence after the December 18, 2023 election in which he was rejected through the ballot.

IPAC in a statement signed by the national publicity secretary, Chinyere Ogekalu and made available to press yesterday in Abuja was reacting to a press conference statement issued on January 2, 2024 by Dr Alex Maiyanga, the national organising secretary of the ADP, a party in which Yabagi Sani is the national chairman.

Ogekalu noted that on the 12th of December 2023, some progressive party leaders resisted the attempt by Engr. Yabagi Sani to perpetuate himself in office beyond the expiration of his tenure on the 13th of December 2023.

She said in vindication of those who resisted him and in furtherance of his desperation, Engr. Yabagi Sani ran to court on the 28th of December 2023 to get a court order stopping the inauguration of the newly elected IPAC National Executives while the court at the same time directed the current IPAC Executives to continue to run the affairs of the Council until the determination of the suit.

She said that the court may have been misled by Yabagi Sani to remain in power at all cost for self aggrandizement and not for the good or love of the organisation.

“This is rightly so because an election was conducted on the 18th of December 2023 where new IPAC National Executives emerged in a transparent electoral process covered by the media and Engr. Yabagi Sani who lost after scoring 8 votes against 10 votes scored by his opponent, Alh. Yusuf Dantalle hailed the process as democracy in action and congratulated the winner. The question is why the haste in running to the court after not only congratulating the winner but filing a petition challenging the outcome of the election on the 22nd of December 2023 at the IPAC Election Appeal Committee set up by his tyrannical administration?”

She said the court having been deceived by Engr. Yabagi Sani may not have been aware that at the time when the order was granted on the 29th December 2023, the tenure of Engr. Yabagi Sani already expired and new IPAC National Executives led by Alh. Yusuf Dantalle had equally emerged on the 18th of December 2023 and already started carrying out the mandate of their respective offices after signing an oath of office the following day.

“Inauguration of executives which is not known to IPAC Code of Conduct is just a ceremonial event, hence asking the court to give him what he couldn’t get through the ballot only goes to show the desperation of a rejected egocentric tyrant determined to superimpose himself on an organization that has moved on from his miserable leadership.

“It is also laughable that the only reason that Engr. Yabagi Sani gave for irregularities in the just concluded election was the reduction of the Electoral Committee to two instead of three that was originally composed. More so, this is coming from a man who has been privileged to set up hundreds of committees during his reign as the National chairman of IPAC without any of such committees ever achieving 50%, which is what is required to form a quorum. For the records, the third person in the electoral committee was unavoidably absent due to an inevitable trip abroad and all decisions were communicated appropriately.

‘In any case, two out of three in a three man committee evidently proved that a quorum was formed, especially when 50% is all that is required according to the IPAC Code of Conduct,” she said.