THE new leadership of the embattled All Progressives Grand Alliance
(APGA) may consider sanctions on some of its leading erring members,
including the Imo State Governor, Rochas Okorocha and Senator Annie
Okonkwo.
The duo are the vocal representatives of the party that
led other members to the merger talks, which resulted in the formation
of a new political group called All Progressives Congress (APC). APC is
the fusion of four existing political parties in the country.
Reacting
to the merger, which came almost at the same time the verdict of an
Enugu High Court that invalidated and sacked the APGA national executive
led by Chief Victor Umeh, a key stakeholder of the party in Anambra and
the Chairman of Peter Obi Campaign Organisation, Sylvester Nwobualor,
said the party would challenge the APC if registered.
According to
Nwobualor, “The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has
already turned down their request for registration, except they drop the
name of APGA”.
He said the issue of the on-going merger moves was
not worth discussing at all because it’s an effort that was bound to
fail. And that all the participating political parties must surrender
their former certificates, after ratification of the new move by their
parties through a convention. He, therefore, wondered whether the
participants knew the details.
Nwobualor, who was the immediate
Special Assistant to Governor Peter Obi on Parks /Markets, admitted that
Governor Okorocha and Senator Okonkwo are free to associate with any
group, but not on the guise of representing APGA, especially when they
were not so mandated.
He frowned at the failure of Okorocha to
have failed to discuss or liaise with Obi on the issue before embarking
on the far-reaching journey.
On the choice of Obi’s replacement,
Nwobualor noted that both Obi and APGA have chosen to allow
Anambra-North Senatorial zone decide, except when they fail to present a
credible marketable candidate.
The political think-tank of APGA
told journalists that the verdict of the Enugu High Court on the
leadership of Umeh was a vindication of his initial stand on the issue
since 2010 when his tenure expired. He also welcomed his readiness to go
on appeal, but counselled him not to bother because it would be an
uphill task to controvert the truth.
Meanwhile, Lagos State
chapter of the Action Congress of Nigeria has affirmed that the All
Progressives Congress (APC) has come to stay and salutes the dexterity
with which the leaders of the new party are handling the task of
midwifing the party.
In a release in Lagos signed by the Lagos
State Publicity Secretary of the ACN, Joe Igbokwe, the party said that
for Nigeria to make meaningful progress and for democracy to survive the
many challenges it is facing now, Nigerians must rally round APC to
reposition the country for progress.
The party expressed its
pleasure at the progress made so far by the merger committee, which it
says, portends that the country can weather its present tortuous
challenges if sincerity of purpose is employed. It urges the committee
to go the whole hog and come out with beautiful, practicable and
cost-effective ways of rescuing the country from the pit of
irrecoverable decay the PDP has ran it into.
“We are particularly
pleased that the leaders of the APC have worked with an uncommon spirit
of sacrifice and seriousness so far. The early results of their efforts
are already running PDP and its allies ragged as all their efforts to
sow discord and strife among the component parties have come to naught.
We salute them and also salute the mass acceptance that has trailed the
formation of APC. We see it as enough proof that the country is tired of
the burden the PDP has been for the past 14 inglorious years. We see
the massive endorsement the APC is receiving through the length and
breadth of the country as proof that Nigerians urgently want change from
the rotten and decadent order that has weighed them down for the past
14 years. We see these as an endorsement of the efforts of the leaders
of the APC and urge them to do more.
“APC is an idea whose time
has come. We restate that no amount of desperation by a fading and
decadent order can stop it. APC is a child of history and history has
taught us that nothing stymies a move that is historically correct. The
rightness and historical correctness of the APC find meaning in the
continued state of sleaze Nigeria has been under the PDP since 1999. We
believe that the continued regression of the nation under the corrupt
and incompetent watch of the PDP assisted tremendously to midwife the
APC. APC will fulfill its historical mission of redirecting the sinking
ship of the Nigerian state and steer it to safety from 2015.
“Lagos
ACN notes the unsettled and clearly disoriented state the PDP had been
thrown into since APC emerged. We note that the PDP is in great disarray
on how to handle the present challenge thrown but the APC and this
disheveled state could be gleaned from the way and manner the party has
so far reacted to the emergence of the APC. The rank and file of the PDP
is caught on a crisis engendered by its well-known notorious value to
the present democracy where it has excelled in looting, impunity,
incompetence and all other forms of inefficiency.
“We note that
since PDP found out that it could not stop the formation of APC, it has
been mobilising its members and allies to sow falsehood, rumours and
gossips with a view to engendering hatred among the leaders of APC. That
they have failed woefully in distracting APC shows that Nigerians are
determined to do away with the nuisance the PDP has constituted in
Nigeria for 14 years.
“We believe that Nigeria is worth dying for
and this worthiness obtains in the prospects of future responsible
governance, which the APC is poised to give. We urge Nigerians who
desire change from this prolonged state of rot to mobilise themselves in
their immediate communities and neighbourhoods and align with APC as
its braces itself for the task of salvaging the state of decadence the
PDP has levied on Nigeria for 14 awful years”.
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