Femi Fani Kayode Explains Why He Left APC.

FFK

I declared for the APC in June last year in Ado Ekiti, Ekiti state well before the party was registered by INEC. I formally joined the party, amidst great fanfare, on 7th February 2014 in my hometown Ile-Ife and I registered my membership on that day.

The registration was done outside the Ooni's palace and it was done in the prescence of the media, numerous party leaders in the state, including Hon. Rotimi Makinde, who represents Ile-Ife at the Federal House, and all the other key leaders of the APC in the state and Ife-Ife including Chief Akantioke and Alhaji Soko Adewoyin the former Deputy Governor of Osun state.

After registering we proceeded to pay a courtesy call on my traditional ruler, the Ooni of Ife, and from there I went to spend a few days with Governor Rauf Aregbesola who, together with Governor Kayode Fayemi, I am close to and I consider to be friends.

I have stated these facts and set the record straight due to the fact that Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the spokesman of the APC, had the effontry to say in an interview with Premium Times magazine earlier today, that I was never a member of the APC and that I never joined them formally.

He also went further to say that had if I had been a member of the APC the party would have sanctioned me for expressing my opposition to the idea of a muslim/muslim ticket. The truth is that Mohammed is not only a liar but he is also a coward. If he wanted to know the truth he and those that sent him to issue the statement could have called me and asked me.

He ought to have done his homework before speaking out. I was not only a member of the APC but I was also a leader of that party and a foundational member. Yet once I joined I began to see things as they really were. I have never been and will never be part of a cult and the fact that people like Mohammed and those he represents within the APC are not comfortable with any form of admonition or criticism from senior party members like me speaks volumes.

I have nothing but the fondest thoughts and memories for the majority of APC leaders including all the governors and most of the Presidential aspirants but today I have an important announcement to make. I wish to inform the general public that as at today, 2nd June 2014, I have left the APC and gone back to the PDP. I wish the APC well in all their endeavours but as at today we have parted ways forever and my spirit has left them.

My reasons for leaving the party are because I consider nation-buildingas being far more important than party politics, party affiliation or party formations. I am a devout and committed christian and I cannot remain in a party where a handful of people that have sympathies for Boko Haram and that have a clear islamic agenda are playing a leading role. This is made all the more untenable when some of those people are working hard silently and behind the scenes to impose a muslim/muslim ticket on the party for the Presidential elections next year.

I believe that religion ought to play no part in politics but a situation where members of the christian faith are not treated as equals and where the all the substantive positions of the National Executive of the party are made up of almost exclusively muslims is unacceptable to me.

In fairness to the members of the party there are many leaders within it's ranks who share my views and who are also opposed to the religious agenda that the few have but I am not prepared to stay and fight from within because the very prescence of any closet Haramites on the same political platform as me is something that I find utterly repugnant.

I have raised these issues privately with virtually every key party leader including most of the governors but nothing has changed. I cannot be in a party in which the spokesman. Lai Mohammed, only last year said that it was wrong and ''unconstitutional'' for the Federal Government to proscribe Boko Haram.

This is the same Boko Haram that has killed no less than 15,000 Nigerians in the last three years. I cannot be in a party where the leading Presidential candidate, only last year said that Boko Haram ought to be killed but ought to be treated like the Niger Delta militants, granted amnesty without any conditions, pampered and paid and who said, in 2001, that muslims should only vote for people who will protect their faith.

I cannot be in a party where a number of leading people question the secularity of the state and yet those people are not called to order by the so-called party leaders and where such people seem to hold sway. I cannot be in a party which appears to have politicised the whole of the Chibok issue and who are not sincere in trying to get the girls back. I cannot be in a party where a few of it's leaders are more interested in playing politics with the whole Chibok issue and hurling bricks at our military for not doing a better job.



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