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INTERNAL CRISIS MAY SCUTTLE APC CHANCES AT LOCAL GOVERNMENT ELECTIONS

By Paulinus Etim

 

The intractable crisis currently ravaging the Akwa Ibom State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) may likely affect the fortunes of the party in the forth-coming Local Government Elections in November this year, if party members fail to put their house in order.

The party which has been sharply divided into two opposing tendencies, both of which struggle to get a stranglehold of its structures right from the 329 wards, through the 31 chapters, the three Senatorial Districts to the State Executive Council, has been enmeshed in crisis for upwards of two years now.

Leading the two factions of the party are Obong Nsima Ekere, Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), and Senator John Udoedehe, a former Minister of State, Federal Capital Territory (FCT) respectively.

While Ekere joined the party about two years ago when he realized that he will not pick the governorship ticket of his former party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2015, Udoedehe is one of the founding fathers of APC both at the national and state levels.

The contention of Udoedehe is that, as one of those who sacrificed his time, energy and funds to build up the party from the scratch, it is an aberration for a stranger element to stroll into the party from outside and be handed her ticket on a platter of gold, just as it happened in 2015, when some national officers sat in Abuja and handed the governorship ticket to Obong Umana Okon Umana, who was barely three months old in the party.

Because Udoedehe has refused to shift grounds based on the premise that he teamed up with other founding members to build the party in the state, APC has irretrievably been divided into the old APC members and the new APC members, most of the later faction members being decampees from the PDP in the state.

As at the time of filing this report, the bone of contention of both camps is, who controls the different structures of the party in the state.

And whoever controls the party structures will most likely pick up the governorship ticket of the party.

While the two factions are bickering over their party structures, they have left preparations for the November 2017 Local Government Elections in the lurch and that may likely drive the nail into the coffin of the party in the state as most of her members may likely abandon the party in droves to seek solace in the rival PDP.

Meanwhile, the PDP has taken the bull by its horns, as the State Executive of the party has begun a state wide tour of all the 10 Federal Constituencies last Tuesday, immediately  after the State Chairman of the Party, Obong Paul Ekpo had on Monday inaugurated the Local Government Coordinators and Secretaries in the 31 LGAs for the November, 2017 Local Government Elections.

Observers believe that with the superlative performance of Governor Udom Emmanuel in the last two and a half years, coupled with the monolithic structure of PDP in the state, the party will have no problem coasting away with victory for all the chairmanship candidates across the 31 LGAs as well as all the 329 Councillorship candidates she will put forward for the November elections

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