Nentawe Yilwatda, the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has minimized the political significance of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), maintaining that the ruling party is still far stronger and more powerful.
In an interview with Channels Television’s Politics Today on Tuesday, Yilwatda reportedly referred to the ADC as a weak opposition force, citing notable members of the opposition coalition such as former Senate President David Mark, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, former House Speaker Aminu Tambuwal, former Anambra State Governor and 2023 Labour Party presidential candidate Peter Obi, and former Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola.
Yilwatda also denied accusations that the opposition’s coalition of powerful politicians is unsettling the ruling party, emphasizing that the APC is unbeatable and citing continued defections by opposition governors as proof of the party’s increasing popularity.
The APC chairman emphasized that the party’s control is founded on voluntary support rather than coercion or intimidation, and that the government is neither threatened nor desperate.
“ADC is not a match at all” (for the APC), he declared. We have five or six of them for every one of them.
In response to accusations that the APC is pressuring civil servants to join it, Yilwatda vehemently refuted the accusation and urged detractors to produce evidence.
He added that the APC’s numerical superiority obviously favors it and suggested that such claims might be an opposition projection.
“We have never made an appeal to any civil servant, and we have never asked anybody,” he continued. No civil servant has been coerced verbally, in writing, or through a video; I will apologize.
