Tunji Adedeji
The crisis rocking the All Progressive Congress (APC) Imo State chapter has taken a more dangerous dimension as the national leadership of the party yesterday, disclosed that the issue of submission of governorship candidates to INEC has failed, assuring that APC would only decide who will be APC’s governorship candidate for Imo State by November 2nd”
Trumpeta’ s investigations showed that the governing party was facing a Herculean task resolving the crises caused by the primaries in Imo, Ogun, Zamfara and Adamawa states .
The national leadership of All Progressives Congress, APC led by Comrade Adams Oshiomole pointed out that the party hasn’t reached the stage of submitting names or beat the deadline, stressing that there was a court action challenging the Imo governorship primary election.
He maintained that the position of party is that whatever court judgment, good or bad, we must comply with it. We will only decide who will be APC’s governorship candidate for Imo State by November 2nd”
Trumpeta was reliably informed that a meeting of APC governors set to articulate issues against Oshiomhole was set to hold last night and the prospects of getting a full house was in doubt yesterday over assertions that some governors had departed from the agitation against the party chairman which some of them were beginning to see as a personal project of Governors Okorocha and Yari ,
Trumpeta also gathered that the NWC had penciled down Senator Hope Uzodinma as the party’s candidate despite the insistence by Governor Okorocha that he should have the Senate ticket for himself and the governorship ticket for his son-in-law. A source privy to the development said: “Rochas was asked to take one of the two, either Senate ticket or governorship but he is insisting on the two. What do we do with the others? He is saying that he can win the election for us alone, but we cannot take his word to the bank,” the source said.
The NWC, Trumpeta gathered has upon the governor’s insistence penciled down Uzodinma’s name for the governorship, a fact he said might have stimulated Okorocha’s angst.
Trumpeta further gathered that the national leadership of All Progressives Congress, APC, yesterday, rallied against forces seeking removal of the chairman, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, describing Governors Abdulaziz Yari of Zamfara, Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun and Rochas Okorocha of Imo states as bad losers.
The party said the governors sought to circumvent the democratic process to protect their interests. Governor Okorocha, Trumpeta was reliably told, may have continued his agitations against Oshiomhole, having discovered that contrary to expectations, his son-in-law’s name, Uche Nwosu, was not submitted as the APC governorship candidate.
Amosun, Okorocha and Yari Senator Hope Uzodinma’s name was pencilled down for submission in respect of the governorship by the Oshiomhole leadership to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
The party’s claims came against the background of foundering moves by the anti-Oshiomhole lobby to rally themselves to force out the former governor of Edo State from the office of national chairman. All these came as Governor Rotimi Akeredolu yesterday said the All Progressives Congress (APC) primaries has exposed the incompetence of the party’s national chairman, Adams Oshiomhole. Akeredolu was reacting to an allegation that three governors led by him were bent on sabotaging the party.
A meeting of the anti-Oshiomhole governors scheduled to hold last night was still on hold upon misgivings among some of the governors that the anti-Oshiomhole agitation had turned into a personal agenda for Governors Yari who is chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum, NGF and Okorocha, chairman of the APC Progressive Governors Forum, PGF.
