ANAYO EZUGWU 
Umar Farouk is the factional National Secretary of Labour Party (LP). In this interview, he speaks on the supremacy battle between the Julius Abure and Peter Obi factions of the party, and the 2027 presidential ticket of the party, among other issues. ANAYO EZUGWU writes
What do you make of what happened recently when the All Progressives Congress (APC) held its national summit and it looks like President Bola Tinubu is setting a new record of endorsements just less than two years before he finishes his first tenure in office?
It is politics in action but i will say that leadership of the opposition parties gave the APC a very wide space for them to sing, dance and behave the way they are behaving.
You will agree with me that there is no vibrant opposition. The core parties that are supposed to have given APC a very stiff opposition are the Labour Party, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and of course, when you look at the trajectory of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) presidential candidate, they have given this government a very stiff opposition, but where are they now.
All of them are engaged in one crisis or the other. I, as a party administrator, I’m not involved in the crisis. I do not have any hand in the crisis that is going on.
You see, the leadership of a political party is to ensure a level playing field for all the aspirants for the various elective positions, which we did. Between 2022 to 2023, we gave our tickets to the best of candidates that we think are going to win election and are going to represent their constituents very credibly well.
Some of them won elections, while some lost, but instead of them to sit down and start strategizing for future engagements, they turned against the party that gave them tickets to run and campaigned for them. If you lose election, sit down and review reasons for the loss. Is it the party that caused your loss or is it you or your supporters or you were rigged out?
They failed to do that postmortem and come up with a strategy to win elections in future. If they are real democrats, they will know that participating in politics is not all about winning election, but ensuring that the people get dividends of democracy and that a credible government is established in the country.
There is not going to be more than one president and one governor in a state. So out of the 18 political parties, only one was going to win the presidential election.
However, the remaining 17 are also going to be participants in governance because they will see what is wrong in the polity and push the government to address it. Alhaji Atiku Abubakar had been in government at least as a vice president for over eight years, and he has been a businessman.
Obi has also been in government; he was a governor for eight years and a businessman. So, there is no policy that will come up that is going to be new to them.
President Bola Tinubu said APC dominance is largely because there is just one party that is delivering dividends of democracy. Do you think that that is a fair reflection of issues in Nigeria?
I can say there is no confusion in the opposition parties but there is confusion and chaos among the candidates in the opposition parties. They are the ones that are confused and selling out. Tinubu is a party man.
It is not Abdullahi Ganduje that is making that statement. So, the statement is coming from a candidate that has defeated other candidates. And he is saying you people have not put your house in order.
There is no confusion in the opposition parties, but there is confusion and chaos among the candidates of the opposition parties. They are the ones who are confused and selling out
In Labour Party, our presidential candidate is neither here nor there. He couldn’t give the leadership that is desired and expected of a leader. I expect Obi to know that because it is not a tea party to be in the opposition.
You should have expected that your opponent is going to look at your weak points and strike. If he’s expecting that the ruling party is going to just look at him and allow him to just come and carry the day, he is making a mistake.
Opposition is not about having meetings here and there. No, it’s not so. And let me tell you something; you can believe it or not, the APC as a ruling party, has no hand in the crisis in Labour Party.
How are you so sure about that?
I am very sure because I am the National Secretary of the party. The attack is coming from within. The people who are attacking us are within us. I have not seen anybody coming from outside to attack us.
After all, you see that we are the ones that are being harassed and who are those harassing us. I’m not saying that I’m a hero.
I’m here to be judged by today, tomorrow and posterity. I’m not sitting down here talking as someone who is not going to be accountable for my actions. I want history to vindicate me.
But you backtracked to say that Peter Obi and Alex Otti would get automatic tickets…
I told you the reason. You see, we gave you a ticket and you rejected us.
At what point did they reject it? When they went to Umuahia and held a meeting and said Abure and his NWC and the entire state and local government exco are no more. They have sacked them.
So, you decided to do tit for tat…
Let us be sincere to ourselves. Sometimes, when I am talking to people, I try to withdraw myself from talking to the interviewer. I am talking to the people who are listening to us.
I can’t just come and say, look, now he is coming and scrambling to get a ticket, something that you have, and something that the president is looking for.
Is it not the same thing they are doing for this president and now when we did that, the same thing, you said the people that have even gone to the extent of giving you a ticket, even if it was not illegitimate.
If we respect him and give him that kind of respect, that we are reserving this ticket for him on the ground that as long as he is with us in the Labour Party, he has the first right of firts refusal, is it not commendable?
Look at what Tinubu said. He said that it’s not time for a campaign; it is an offer. But yet he is still open for contest. What I am trying to say is this.
Peter Obi slighted the leadership for doing what we have done to him for reasons known to him. However, we don’t care about that. That is his history. Now, he has gone out, going from here to there, thinking that he can get us out of the party.
We didn’t do anything. We didn’t say anything. We didn’t fight him back. But at the same time, who knows where he is, is he with our own Labour Party or with his own Nenadi Usman’s Labour Party? So let us not deceive ourselves.
On the issue of the ticket; is it within the powers of the party’s leadership to give it to anybody they deem fit?
It is within the powers of the National Working Committee because they are the people to sit down and organise the convention. It was in the convention that we have done that. The convention sat down an adopted them as our candidates but they rejected it.
And since they rejected it, we took back our tickets. But, Obi seems to have made a detour and he is now seeking to contest election in Labour Party.
I would only be happy with him if he comes and says, I have now realised that what we have done was wrong, and we have agreed to work with the Abure-led leadership.
Are you saying that the only way you can welcome Obi is if he accepts Abure as the national chairman of the party?
Absolutely, otherwise why should I work with him? He is working alone. There is nothing like self-preservation; it is preserving the integrity of the constitution.
If I am talking about Labour Party, and I am a leader of the Labour Party. If you don’t recognise me as a leader of the Labour Party; who are you to me?
