By MBACHU GODWIN, Abuja
Former National Chairman of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, Chief Ralphs Okey Nwosu has revealed the attempts by the federal government to scuttle the birth of opposition coalition, saying that he was offered money and three Ministerial slot to kill the coalition.
Nwosu made this revelation at the party’s maiden National Executive Committee NEC, meeting in Abuja , while addressing members of NEC.
He noted that he rejected the offer from the presidency in order to rescue Nigeria from a one party state and birth a coalition for a new Nigeria as well as strengthen democracy.
Nwosu said “We’ve taken the step so that Nigerian democracy will be on road, on the track again. Instead of one party, one individuals wanting to create fascism, convert Nigeria to one state, to one party, state. It was only the ADC that said no, our party. ADC said no, and Nigerians took part to embrace us for saying no, that we must have an opposition party, another party in force.
“No matter the kind of money you spend, you cannot fight all Nigerians. There are some politicians, for some reasons, opportunistic. They feel that it’s all about money, and they will tell you, if you can’t get them with this amount of money, what you need is more money. But we in ADC, especially the NWC members, we said, No, we rejected every offer at the point, both in Nigeria and everywhere in the world that we have been to within the last one year plus.
“The ADC leaders were able to say, No, enough is enough. We want to put our democracy on the front again, our democracy is back on track. And you know what? We are expanding everywhere because of competence.
“We did a test run by the trying to show the kind of political leadership we want to put in place moving forward. And when we unveiled one of our decisions that day, at our NWC, David mark as Our chairman for instance and as Secretary with the publicity.
You know what happened? Within one week, our membership grew from maybe 600 people who were paying membership dues to almost 3 million who started paying membership Nigerians who are paying membership dues.
And each state have told, have told us that we must print a minimum of 2 million membership card for them.
Nigerians have shown that we love the party that you’ve created. There’s no reward system that is better”
Speaking, interim National Chairman, Sen. David Mark assured members that the ADC will take over the reign of power in the 2027 general election, urging it’s members to be united and focused.
He added that the party has reserved 35 Percent leadership positions for women .
The National Executive Committee, NEC, witnessed the handing over of the leadership to the new executives led by Sen. Mark.
END
