Former president Yahya Jammeh has warned his party officials that he will not allow anyone to take over APRC from him. 

Jammeh has ordered his newly established council of elders to abolish all other executive positions in the party in his absence.

In a telephone address to his party members, Jammeh said from his base in Equatorial Guinea: “I have spoken to the council of elders and I have high confidence in them. They should not compromise with discipline and they shouldn’t compromise with the rotten woods that are there in positions and they are not delivering and they don’t want others to deliver.

“And let me also make it very clear, there will not be any rebranding of the party. The party has a manifesto and the manifesto is sacrosanct. For 22 years, we’ve made sure when we were having a meeting of the executive of the APRC everybody came when I called for a meeting. Sometimes they also called for their own meeting and then came and informed me about it on a topic that we have already agreed upon. 

“So, this trend is not going to happen. We are not going to bring in any monkey changes to the APRC. It’s not going to happen. This issue of mobiliser general is rubbish. Let them abolish it. What we know is national mobiliser.

“In fact, this national mobiliser role is to make sure that he mobilises people and during campaigns he goes ahead before the campaign starts to sensitise people. 

“But not a national mobiliser general who sits at home and talks rubbish. It’s not going to happen. Anybody who wants to be a flagbearer better go and create your own party, not my APRC. I want that to be very clear.” 

Reporting by Adama Makasuba