The Tony Okocha-led faction of the All Progressives Congress, APC, in Rivers State has reiterated that it will not participate in the local government elections scheduled for October 5 by the Rivers State Independent Electoral Commission, RSIEC.
Okocha stated this on Wednesday, while addressing party stakeholders and members loyal to him from the 23 local government areas of the state at their own state secretariat, stating that the issues surrounding the October 5 election are still under litigation.
He expressed doubt about the possibility of the election holding on the specified date and questioned the legitimacy of the election, noting the absence of APC and the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, chairmen at the RSIEC stakeholders meeting.
Okocha wondered which political parties would be able to contest under these circumstances.
He said: “The topical issue we have to discuss is the issue of APC contesting local government elections on October 5.
“That is one thing you would like to hear. We are in court and I will not speak in any matter that is in court. The most I can say to you is that the cause of action is to restrain the agencies that will conduct that election that they announced behind us.
“We are not part of the decision to conduct an election on October 5. We went on air on January 19 to tell the INEC chairman and the commission to convey the process of having that local government election; at that time, it was still within the ambits of the laws of the state because the law says three months to the expiration of the life of a chairman or tenure of the council that the national body should organise an election.
“That the process should commence, the table released and that the 21 days inside those three months, an election should hold.
“That law, as we speak, will not work. It will not work if you cannot conduct local government elections in Rivers State without a party like the APC. I know too that the PDP is not even in the race so what we see is just a drama.”
He added: “The reason we went to court is not because we don’t have the numbers or that we don’t have the strength. I can assure you and you know for yourself that we have men and women that can contest any election and win.
“We are saying that the process should be strengthened to be transparent so that we cannot just go and work on thorns and get ourselves hurt.
“I was only a whistleblower because that election will not represent the interests and the opinions of those who will vote. It is already a stereotype.
“The handout had already been written. We have built party formations, and we have built elections in this state. They are just coming in and they need to learn from us how we succeeded.
“So if you have to go by a good approach, you will not succeed. The day that they said they had a stakeholder meeting, I was not invited. The APC Rivers State was not invited to the stakeholders meeting where the decision for the October 5 election was taken.
“So we cannot participate in that election because there was a deliberate plan to make us worthless so we went to court.
“We are not saying we wouldn’t contest the election; our contention is that the process is not in tandem with the law and that we as a party are also aware we were not carried along in the entire arrangement.”
He reiterated that the APC National Working Committee, NWC, has declared him the authentic CTC chairman of the party in Rivers State. He urged party members to disregard rumours from the APC under the leadership of Emeka Beke.
Okocha commended the party members for their support of President Bola Tinubu and urged them to continue, assuring them that the party would protect the integrity of the Renewed Hope Family structure of President Tinubu.
Some notable members present at the meeting include Ojukayi Flag-Amachree, Senator Wilson Ake, and Wogu Boma, amongst others.
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