On Saturday, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Abia State will choose a new governorship candidate for the election scheduled for March 11.
Following the passing of Uchenna Ikonne, the party’s candidate for governor in the state, the primary election was repeated.
The family released a statement on behalf of Mr. Ikonne, a professor and former vice chancellor of the Abia State University Uturu, stating that he died away on January 25 at the National Hospital Abuja.
Governor Okezie Ikpeazu has approved the professor of optometry as his favoured replacement.
Zoning Argument
The party designated the ticket to the Abia North and Abia Central senatorial districts before Mr. Ikonne was elected.
Numerous party members from beyond the two districts voiced their opposition to the agreement, according to PULSENETS. Later, several of them left the PDP in protest.
The deceased governorship candidate was from the Isiala Ngwa North Council Area village of Nsulu.
Ikonne’s hometown, Isiala Ngwa North, is located in the Abia Central District.
The PDP micro-zoned the ticket to Isiala Ngwa North in the Abia Central District after he passed away.
The PDP has kept its position in the district, as evidenced by the rezoning of the ticket to the district.
Three-man combat
Many candidates, mostly from Abia North, were obliged to drop out of the new campaign as a result of the new arrangement, PULSENETS has learned.
According to information obtained by this publication, the PDP has approved three candidates from Isiala Ngwa North to run for the ticket. They are Eric Opah, a well-known businessman, the State Commissioner for Works, Bob Ogu, and Okey Ahiwe, the Chief of Staff to Governor Ikpeazu.
It was said that Ogu and the businessman Opah were utilised to increase the number in order to avoid presenting only one participant for the activity. However, sources claimed that if the party wins the general election, the two will be granted official jobs.
Trouble lurks even now
Despite the rise and passing of Ikonne last year, a disagreement surrounding the choice of three-member ad-hoc delegates from each ward has not yet been put to rest. At the primary, only the delegates are allowed to cast ballots.
How it started
Many party members had claimed that a “fake” list of ad hoc delegates had been produced across the 184 wards of the state prior to the last primary.
Ward congresses for the PDP election had been scheduled for April 30 but were postponed as a result of a court ruling.
Even though the party rescheduled the congresses for May 4 after the judgement was overturned, they were unable to take place due of a holiday that day.
Governor Ikpeazu allegedly created a list of the delegates from all of the wards and forwarded it to the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party while some party members waited for the announcement of a new date for the congresses.
However, Ikpeazu and his supporters asserted that the ward congresses were held on May 6 notwithstanding the denials of seven of the then-candidates.
At a news conference held on May 22 at the party’s office in Abuja, the aspirants—led by Enyinnaya Abaribe, the then-Senate Minority Leader—asked the NWC to act quickly to avert the “impending collapse” of the party in Abia State.
One of the seven candidates that rejected the delegate list was Ude Chukwu, who was serving as the state’s deputy governor at the time and was also a candidate for governor at the time.
The list, according to the then-candidates, is a nullity, and their submission of it to the party’s national secretariat was illegal, they said.
“Only the national chairman and national secretary of a political party can communicate with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) at their National Headquarters in respect of congresses, primaries and conventions. Neither the state chairman of a party nor the REC of INEC has (sic) any role in the matter and so the said congresses of the 6th day of May 2022 are dead on arrival,” Mr Abaribe had said at the conference, on behalf of the six others.
“It is preposterous that what is being bandied as a list emanated from an imaginary congress conducted via a letter of notice to the Abia State Resident Electoral Commissioner signed by the Abia State Chairman of the PDP, Mr. Allwell Asiforo Okere. The implication being that the functions of NEC and NWC were performed by a State Chairman of the party and not the National Chairman and Secretary of PDP,” he added.
INEC position
INEC has also said that the Abia State PDP did not hold its ad hoc delegate election.
“Please, refer to your letter dated May 11, 2022 requesting confirmation if the commission is in receipt of a letter from the PDP national chairman and national secretary that rescheduled the party’s Abia State ward congresses that failed to hold on May 4, 2022.
“This is to confirm that the last notice received from the PDP national headquarters was the one that scheduled the Abia State ward congress May 4, 2022,” INEC said in a letter, adding that it was still expecting a new date after the congress failed to hold on the scheduled date.
The letter, dated 13 May and signed by the commission’s Secretary, Rose Oriaran-Anthony, was issued in response to an inquiry from an Abuja-based legal practitioner.
The party section in the state loyal to Mr Ikpeazu, on the other hand, insisted on holding the three-member delegate elections.
Some of the seven disgruntled hopefuls, including Mr Abaribe, eventually switched to state opposition political organisations.
Implication
A member of the PDP in the state, who did not want to be identified, told PULSENETS that the old and contentious delegate list used during Mr Ikonne’s election will be used again for the repeat primary.
However, PULSENET learned that the list’s authenticity is currently being questioned before the Federal High Court in Umuahia.
Sampson Orji, one of the hopefuls in the 25 May primary, filed a lawsuit in court demanding the cancellation of Mr Ikonne’s gubernatorial ticket on the grounds that the delegates who voted in the primary were not elected.
The court has yet to pronounce on the subject, according to reports.
There are fears that if the PDP holds the rerun primary without resolving the delegate list problem, it may jeopardise its prospects of participating in the general election, as happened in Zamfara State in 2019.
“It remains an albatross on anyone that gets the governorship ticket,” a high-profile party member said of the delegate list.
The Case of Zamfara
In Zamfara State, two factions of the All Progressives Congress, led by Kabiru Marafa and then-Governor Abdul’aziz Yari, competed for leadership of the party ahead of the 2019 elections.
Due to the disagreement, the party was unable to organise proper primary elections within the timeframe allowed by law.
Although the INEC allowed the party to participate in the polls and the party won every seat, including the governorship, the Supreme Court later voided all votes cast for the party and, as a result, the victory of all its candidates in the state’s general elections on February 23 and March 16, 2029.
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