THE WILL NEWS
When the presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, took to his twitter handle last Wednesday to say that he was being pressured to leave the country amid the Federal Government’s accusation of treasonable and inciting statements, it was left to the imagination to wonder who were those mounting the pressure.
For the Chief Spokesperson of the party, Tanko Yinusa, the pressure is real. Family members and friends, associates and a very important person who feared for the safety of the Anambra former governor were behind the pressure.
“And it is borne out of a background: The FGs accusation of treason against him and his deputy, Datti Baba Ahmed, the doctored audio conversation with Bishop David Oyedepo designed to smear him are being used to make the party abandon the court cases to reclaim our mandate,” Yinusa told THEWILL on Friday.
“We know the hand of Esau when we see one. He is not leaving the country. Now, they want to remove the National Chairman of the party through frivolous court cases. It is only the National Working Committee of the party that can remove the Chairman. We will see the end of the post-election court case to reclaim our mandate legally.”
All through the weekend, the internal crisis within the party persisted, reaching a head with the emergence of a faction, which formed an executive committee on the strength of an Abuja High Court through an exparte motion removing the National Chairman of the party, Julius Abure, for alleged forgery, embezzlement, perjury and anti-party activities.
The four appointed officers in acting capacities are National Vice Chairman, (South) Alhaji Lamidi Apapa as Acting National Chairman; Alhaji Salek Lawan, as Acting National Secretary; Comrade Reuben Favour, Acting Organising Secretary and Acting National Treasurer, Rowland Daramola.
The new NCW members immediately went about reversing the suspension of two members of the NCW, namely Comrade Arabambi Abayomi, National Publicity Secretary and Comrade Eragbe Anslem, National Youth Leader. State Executive council members who were suspended were reinstated in Ogun, Rivers and Gombe.
Speaking for the new order in LP, Arabambi Abayomi told THEWILL that the party’s crisis is self-inflicted and lays the problem on the shoulders of Abure, whom he accused of forgery and perjury and fraud.
“The fraud and forgeries were perpetrated during the conduct of primary for National Assembly members and governorship candidates for the party. Money was collected from those whose names were substituted with names of candidates submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC. We have been pursuing the cases in court and when the one in FCT High Court sailed through, we asked for the copy of the judgement which the police used to issue a warrant of arrest on the National Chairman.”
With the Abure-led NCW denouncing the FCT Abuja court judgement, arguing that a court of competent jurisdiction has also upheld his powers as national chairman of the LP, the leadership crisis has further polarised the party.
But Abure’s NCW had needed help thrown its way when the owners of the party, the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, threw their weight behind him.
