The National Executive Committee (NEC) of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has confirmed the appointment of the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Professor Nentawe Yilwatda, as the new National Chairman of the party.
The announcement was made during the NEC meeting ongoing at the State House Conference Centre in Abuja.
The chairman of the Progressive Governors’ Forum, Governor Hope Uzodimma, nominated him for the position. House of Representatives speaker, Abbas Tajudeen, seconded the motion.
Yilwatda’s emergence as the new National Chairman of the APC marks a deliberate return of the position to the North Central region, aligning with the party’s original zoning arrangement. Yilwatda hails from Plateau State and replaces Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, the former Kano State governor, who recently resigned.
It is understood that the decision to appoint Yilwatda, a Christian from the North Central zone, is a strategy to address internal grievances, particularly over the continued dominance of a Muslim-Muslim leadership structure at the federal level, led by President Bola Tinubu and Vice President Kashim Shettima.
Yilwatda is an loyalist of former Plateau State Governor and current Senator, Simon Lalong. He assumed the role of Minister of Humanitarian Affairs following Lalong’s resignation from the cabinet to return to the Senate. It can be recalled that the Court of Appeal overturned the earlier declared winner in the Plateau South Senatorial race.
Before his ministerial appointment, Yilwatda was the APC governorship candidate in Plateau State during the 2023 general elections but was defeated by the PDP’s Caleb Mutfwang. He also played a key role in the presidential campaign as the state coordinator for the Tinubu/Shettima Campaign Organisation.