Fresh crisis hits APGA as two parallel National Executives emerges

The All Progressives Grand Alliance on Friday elected two parallel National Executives.
While a faction of the party held its National Convention in Owerri, the Imo State capital, the other executives emerged in Awka, Anambra State.
Edozie Njoku National Chairman at the party’s convention held in Owerri and attended by delegates from each of the 36 states of the federation and Abuja.
Njoku, first National Vice Chairman (South) of the party, who hails from Ibeku, in Aboh Mbaise Council Area of Imo State, would be leading the party for the next four years.
The new chairman addressed a teeming crowd of party members shortly after his election.
He noted that the convention and his election came as a result of the nullification of the outcome of the meeting of the National Executive Council of the party held on April 14 in Awka, Anambra, by a court of competent jurisdiction.
He said: “I will take all necessary steps to reconcile all aggrieved members and rebuild our party.
“If we must support any politician, it will be a collective decision and not a one man show.
“All we want is for democracy to reign in our party. We should desist from unwarranted criticism and put heads together to rebuild APGA.”
The APGA chieftain castigated Chief Victor Oye and his team for allegedly plunging the party into what he called avoidable crisis through chains of anti-party activities.
Ibeku said: “We need to apologise to all those who were misled and shortchanged before and during the last general elections because we are prepared to heal the wounds.
“APGA is our party. We collectively resolved and agreed that the post of the National Chairman must leave Anambra for another state.
“With a sincere spirit of team work, we shall rebuild our party. I must consistently keep on protecting the interest of APGA and nobody can push us out of this party.”
In Awka, Dr. Ike Oye and Labaran Maku emerged as APGA’s National Chairman and Secretary respectively for a second tenure of four years.
Oye was re-elected alongside other former national executive members at the party’s national convention held at Dora Akunyili Women Development Centre, Awka.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that all the national officials were re-elected through an unanimous voice vote from the party delegates drawn from the six geopolitical zones of the country.
In an acceptance speech, Oye thanked the delegates for re-electing them for a second tenure, saying that the gesture demonstrated the confidence they reposed in them.
He said: “We will not abuse the confidence.”
He said that his leadership was aware of the enormous challenges facing the party and promised that they would steer the ship of APGA to safety.
Oye further said that APGA had risen to become the third largest party in Nigeria and that the task before the party leadership at all levels was how to win elections.
He said: “Our main goal as leaders of the party is to win elections and we have no choice than to take the party to the centre stage of national politics.
“Another immediate challenge before APGA is the need to build a national secretariat in Abuja because we are still operating from a rented office.”
Oye assured the party faithful that the N1.3 billion realised through the sale of forms during the general elections was intact in the bank.
He appealed to all the aggrieved members, who defected to other parties to return, saying that they still had a lot to enjoy in APGA.
Also, Governor Willie Obiano of Anambra State hailed the peaceful conduct of the party’s congresses from ward to national level.
Obiano, who doubles as the Chairman, Board of Trustees of the party, urged the re-elected officials to work harmoniously and in line with the party’s guiding principle of unity and oneness.
Highlights of the event included the swearing-in of a 32-member board of trustees of the party.
Membership of the board included Emeka Ojukwu, the first son of the founder of APGA, late Dim Chukwuemeka Ojukwu; his wife, Bianca; Prof. Charles Soludo, former Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria; Senator Ifeanyi Ararume; and Chief John Gbor, the party’s presidential candidate, among others.