Prof Greg Ibe |
PDP's latest decampee, Professor Greg Ibe says it is lack of honour amongst PDP leadership that forced him to defect to the All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA. He cited two instances in 2015 and 2019 where the party firmly muscled other aspirants out of the governorship race based on the Abia Charter of Equity.
He expressed regrets that ahead 2023 election, the same PDP leadership are now equivocating over the same issue.
Ahead 2023 governorship election, "....PDP leadership in the state is not ready to honour the Abia Charter of Equity", says the Chancellor of Gregory University, Uturu (GUU) during an interactive session with journalists at his Uturu home
Ibe said that in 2015, based on the understanding that the Abia Charter if Equity is sancrosanct, he was prevailed upon by PDP elders, to step down his governorship aspirations on the premise that it was the turn of Abia South to be Governor.
“Convinced by the arguments put forward by our former Governor, Sen. Theodore Orji, on the need to implement the content of ‘The Abia Charter of Equity’ document, I not only stepped down but also deployed my resources and organising acumen to ensure the emergence of a PDP aspirant from Abia South in the person of Dr Okezie Ikpeazu as the candidate, and subsequently campaigned vigorously for him to become Governor of our State in 2015.
“In 2019, when the Governor, Dr Okezie Ikpeazu was to go for a re-election, he sent a delegation of political leaders and elders of Ukwa La Ngwa, led by the duo of Sen. Adolph Wabara and Elder Emmanuel Adaelu, to secure the support of Abia North.
“At a meeting hosted by me right here in my country home, it was unanimously agreed that if Governor Okezie gets reelected to complete his second term, at the expiration of that tenure, power will return to Abia North.”
Ibe said that in the same vein, the traditional rulers of Ukwa La Ngwa met with their counterparts of old Bende and Isuikwuato extraction and made a similar promise that if Ikpeazu is reelected to complete his second term, power will return to Abia North.
He said that the aftermath of these meetings led him and the people of Abia North, to mobilize men and materials to ensure that Governor Ikpeazu was reelected in the 2019 Governorship elections, despite all odds.
Ibe however said that it is surprising to him and everyone that during the recent PDP congress in Abia, all positions were rotated according to the zoning formula except the governorship was conspicuously left out from zoning arrangement.
“One, therefore, wonders why the position of Governor was not zoned at the same time but left in limbo
One, therefore, wonders why the position of Governor was not zoned at the same time but left in limbo. Fast forward to 2022 and every keen observer of developments in Abia PDP will definitely be worried.
Ibe maintained that having consulted widely and conferred extensively with Abians at home and abroad, he has decided to pursue his governorship ambition on the platform of APGA
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