Venatius Ikem has described his removal as the Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party in Cross River State by the State Working Committee as faulty and against the party’s constitution, threatening a court action.
Ikem, who described his removal as political, fielded questions from newsmen in Calabar, the Cross River State capital, on Saturday.
He described the allegations against him put forward by the SWC as not only baseless, but an attempt made to portray him as misfit for the office he had held for over four years.
It will be recalled that the SWC had on Friday removed Ikem from office as the chairman of the party on allegations of financial misappropriation, high-handiness and ineptitude.
Immediately, the SWC announced Austin Edibe, who was the party’s Vice Chairman for the Northern Senatorial District, as his replacement.
Ikem said: “Like they always say, you give a dog a bad name when you want to hang it.
Also Read:
- Five candidates cleared for AfDB presidency race – Committee
- EFCC docks lawyer over alleged N1.3b fraud
- Police arrest two for murder of woman accused of witchcraft in Borno community
- Legends lost! An era closes! A nation mourns! by Abiodun Komolafe
- President Tinubu and Baba Adebanjo: A ‘ringside’ story, by Tunde Rahman
“The truth is that to the best of my knowledge, I run one of the most efficient EXCOS of our party.
“We meet regularly and I think in the last quarter or so we have had two stakeholders meetings, we have our regular State Committee meetings and the stakeholders meetings.
“Secondly, I think there must be issues to discuss.
“Whenever there are issues and programmes, I am always there.
“We just had a party revalidation exercise this year.
“We had the party congresses this year.
“We performed well.
“The last local government election, we stood up very strong and I am very proud of our outing despite the outcome given the circumstances
“To me, I know and everybody knows that I am doing my best to run the party within the context we find ourselves in.
“So talking about not holding meetings or ineptitude leadership is completely out of the question.
“One of the problems I see in PDP is the hangover of being in government.
“We have been in government for so long that many people have never experienced being out of government.
“They believe that things should be the way it used to be when we held sway in government house.
“The drastic change to being an opposition party is not being properly absorbed by our members.
“So their expectations are usually not what is possible in terms of availability of welfare, availability of funds for this and that, but even given that, we have done very well.
“The National Assembly members have been very supportive.
“They have programmes and even with some stipends to support us monthly.”
On the allegation of misappropriation of funds, Ikem, who revealed he ran a cashless policy, said the books were there for everyone to see.
He alleged that the insecurity of a sitting senator was behind his alleged removal.
According to him: “My crime is that I am supporting Hon. Peter Akpanke against him (Senator).
“I don’t know whether anybody is contesting against him in 2027.
“He used to say Peter wanted to contest against him, but Peter has said he is not contesting against him, so I’m supporting Peter against him.
“Those are the underlying political issues.
“These ones are just cover ups to say they have a valid reason.
“The real reason is political, that I should not be supporting Peter.
“For me, the same support I give to him is the same support all my elected officials are entitled to.
“It does not matter the positions they hold.
“So I cannot support him as a senator more than I am supporting other members.”
Follow The Eagle Online Channel on WhatsApp
