Presidential ticket: Mass looms in APC, PDP

• S’ East aspirants form alliance

• Osinbajo, Wike’s visits unsettle party members

• Soludo’s APGA becomes new bride

 

There are strong indications that the Presidential Aspirants of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and their counterparts in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from the South East geopolitical zone may defect to the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) should the two major parties fail to nominate their candidates from the area.

Already, the aspirants from the two parties had earlier met and issued a strong statement insisting that the duo of Chief Chibuike Amaechi and Gov Nyesom Wike were not of the South East geopolitical zone, contending that they would not accept their emergence as Presidential candidates.

In one of their meetings, they resolved tentatively that should any of the major political parties nominate a candidate from the South East, they would collapse their respective structures to back the eventual candidate, irrespective of the party.

They further resolved in principle that should the duo of APC and PDP produce candidates from the South East, they would allow the two candidates to go to the ballot and whoever emerges as President was acceptable to them.

However, the aspirants are already set to play a spoiler’s role by temporarily dumping their parties to produce a Presidential candidate from the APGA. It was equally gathered that they are set to open talks with Governor Charles Soludo and the leadership of APGA for one of them to emerge as Presidential candidate and ultimately pull out the members of the APC and PDP to join APGA on protest.

Confirming these developments, founding National Chairman of the United Progressives Party (UPP) and APGA, Chief Chekwas Okorie, told Sunday Telegraph that the meeting was still on, adding that he was informed by former Imo State Governor, Senator Rochas Okorocha, to which he (Okorie) gave his support.

“It was Senator Rochas Okorocha who gave me this hint about the meeting and they have my total support because this is unprecedented in the history of South East politics and it is a welcome development.

“For the first time, our people are beginning to look inward and weigh their options and chances in the Nigerian polity and the choice of APGA is also good and should this happen, our zone would have made a strong statement that would change the dynamics of the Nigerian politics.

“But my take on the choice of APGA is that they should start early enough and not when the parties may have concluded their respective primaries.

“The timetable for the purchase of forms is between May 28th and June 1st and the last day for submission of forms is June 3rd and by then, there would not be enough time to dump their parties to join APGA.” Okorie further announced that the Ohanaeze Ndigbo would be meeting as at the Ime – Obi meeting which he would be in attendance and expressed optimism that the South East Presidential aspirants should be invited to give bite to their plot.

“It would be interesting and good if Ohanaeze Ndigbo extends the invitation to the meeting to our aspirants and that would of course strengthen their position”, he noted.

Similarly, the National Forum for South East President led by Dr Patrick Enukenu, has resolved that all the members of the APC and PDP from the South East should withdraw their membership and join APGA two days to the conduct of the primary elections if they confirm that the pendulum is not swinging in the favour of the South East. He said: “There are three possible options and should the major parties deny the zone the ticket, all members of the parties would decamp to APGA before the primary elections.

“The second one is should one of the two parties adopt a South East candidate, then others would join hands to support the candidate but should it become a South East affair, then we have nothing to worry at all.

“But if they join APGA, it should also reflect in the National Assembly and governorship elections and with that development, no party can win two-third to form the government at the centre and in that case, zones would come for negotiations in which the South East would play a pivotal role in the alliance.”

Though the National Chairman of APGA, Ozo Victor Oyeh, has maintained studied silence, as feelers from the party indicated that Governor Charles Soludo is given to discussions on the matter and Oyeh is only waiting for the nod from the governor to commence talks.

One of the presidential aspirants of APGA, a retired Chief Judge of Anambra State Justice, Peter Umeadi, is set to be approached for a similar meeting with the APC and PDP aspirants for an eventual defection to his party.

When contacted, his aides said that he was indisposed at the moment to comment on the move but promised to talk at the appropriate time.

Meanwhile, the campaign visits of the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osibanjo and Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State to Anambra State is currently unsettling the peace in the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the area. Similarly, supporters of Presidential aspirants of Non – Igbo extraction have been warned not to coordinate campaigns of those aspirants insisting that it runs counter to the agitation for Igbo Presidency.

The Coordinator, National Forum for South East President, Dr Patrick Enukenu, who spoke to Sunday Telegraph over the weekend said: “What is playing out today is a sheer conspiracy by our Igbo brothers against our demand for a President of Igbo extraction and that is very unfortunate.

“Last time Governor Nyesom Wike came here with our brother, Chris Uba, to campaign and one wonders what our Igbo brothers want to achieve by that. He continued: “Today, we have it on record that most members of the All Progressives Congress, APC and the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP in Anambra State are not happy about this development and we are throwing our weight behind them to stem this act of conspiracy against us.

“We also learnt that members of the two parties have been meeting to suspend those backing aspirants that are not from the South East and we urge them to expedite actions in that regard.”

At Osibanjo”s visit to Awka over the weekend, delegates of the APC, during a stakeholders’ meeting, reminded the Vice President of the agitations of the South East for 2023 general elections, contending that he has to convince them in clear terms why they should support him instead of Senator Chris Ngige who is also in the race.

It was gathered that Osibanjo promised to ensure that the South East would be adequately taken care of by his administration if elected as President, adding that he has come to solicit for their vote during the primary election.

At the end of the meeting, party members were lamenting over what they called the non concrete agreement with the vice president over his ambition, insisting that they are yet to take a position on his ambition.

Party Chairman, Chief Basil Ejidike, could not speak to reporters, who had been waiting for hours to speak with him and Osibanjo as he pleaded that he is indisposed to speak at the moment.