Pepple insists he remains chairman of LP in Rivers

The former chairman of the Labour Party in Rivers State, Dienye Pepple has challenged the dissolution of the Rivers State executives of the party by the national chairman of the party, Julius Abure.

Pepple, who briefed journalists in Port Harcourt on Friday, said the dissolution of the Rivers State executives by the national chairman was not in line with the party’s constitution.

He claimed that the issue is being handled by the National Working Committee of the party and therefore, everything must remain status quo.

Pepple insisted that he remains the chairman of the party in Rivers, pending the decision of a disciplinary committee which is expected to be set up for proper investigation of him and the state executives.

He said: “There was a purported rumour that the exco has been dissolved. So, we want to debunk that. This is a political party, you don’t dissolve exco by staying in one corner to write a small letter. Before an exco is dissolved, due process must be followed.

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“Whatever happens in any state, there must be a disciplinary committee that will investigate the matter which will now make recommendations to the National Working Committee for action. So, you can’t just wake up and say you have dissolved an exco.

“And only the National Chairman signed without the National Secretary signing because the National Secretary knows that it is not the right process. Due process must be followed. So, the National Working Committee is handling the matter. For now, everything must maintain [the] status quo.”

He said the Labour Party in Rivers State does not have a governorship candidate that is ready to win an election, which led to the endorsement of the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Siminalayi Fubara.

He said: “The candidate we have is not ready to run an election. We can’t be following someone that is heading to doom. No form of campaign, nothing.

“We sat down, we discussed with the state exco, and we saw that the right thing to be done is to endorse a candidate that can win the election. It happened in Oyo State, no exco was dissolved; why will Rivers State be different?

“[In] Oyo State, they adopted the serving governor in the state as their candidate. They have a candidate too. We have a candidate that is not ready to run [for] an election. Let us not deceive ourselves,” he said.