Our attention has been drawn to a spurious and incongruous statement credited to the former acting secretary of the defunct Convention Caretaker and Extra-Ordinary Planning Committee CCEPC of the party APC, Senator James Akpanudoedehe, that he was ‘persecuted’ in Akwa Ibom State for purported support for President Muhamadu Buhari.
If not for the negative effect this lie would have on the psyche of the unsuspecting members of the party and the general public, we wouldn’t have dignified this falsehood with any response.
Maybe Udoedehe is mixing up his loyalty to former governor of Lagos State Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who has been sustaining him since the return of democracy in 1999, to mean the same as being a supporter of President Buhari.
To put the record straight, Udoedehe was the governorship candidate of the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), a party formed, nurtured and financed by his then godfather, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whom he has since dumped for Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi.
Sensing defeat and total rejection from Akwa Ibom people at the poll, Udoedehe and his senseless thugs went beserk, setting ablaze vehicles and other empowerment equipment procured by the state government to be distributed to the people.
He was immediately arrested and charged to court for arson. He had his days in court because the state government kept deaf ears to entreaties and pleas from his backers that the case be settled out of court.
President Muhamadu Buhari was not a member of ACN in 2010, when Udoedehe was charged to court. Infact, President Buhari was then a member of the CPC. Why then the spurious and unfounded claims by Udoedehe that the Akwa Ibom State ‘persecuted’ him because of his support for Buhari. Hope not in his dreams?
Udoedehe, as far as we know, was never ‘persecuted’, he was indeed, prosecuted in a competent court of law for crimes against the state.
We will, therefore, advise Udoedehe and his purveyors of falsehood and lies to desist from standing the truth on the head.
The records of his crimes against the state are still there for all to see. They are indeed, stenciled in the hearts of those who witnessed that callousness which denied them the much needed assistance from the state government.
His claims of being ‘persecuted’ for supporting Buhari in 2010 looks childish and an unholy way of looking for unmerited and unnecessary political sympathy.
Udoedehe’s problems started when he was denied the governorship ticket of the APC in 2015. The party leadership then preferred a cool-headed individual and former secretary to the state government, Umana Umana, who had just decamped to the party from the PDP to fly the party’s flag.
The decision of the APC leadership didn’t go down well with Udoedehe and in his normal character, worked seriously against the candidate of his party; Obong Umana Umana at the poll. He teamed up with former governor, Godswill Akpabio, as an APC chieftain to install Udom Emmanuel as the state governor in 2015.
Again, in 2019, Udoedehe made another futile attempt at the governorship ticket of the APC. As it was in 2015, so it was in 2019. Obong Nsima Ekere emerged the popular choice of the party. Despite the fact that the party had given its direction, on its preferred candidate, Udoedehe fought Ekere in the presence of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Comrade Adams Oshiomhole and vehemently refused yielding the party structure to Ekere.
Udoedehe, once again, worked against the success of the party in 2019. He secretly declared his support for Governor Udom Emmanuel. After every APC campaigns, Udoedehe would visit the Hilltop Mansion to brief Governor Emmanuel on the strategies and election plans of the party.
Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State, stated this much when he publicly accused Udoedehe of being APC in the day and PDP at night. He challenged Udoedehe to tell the whole world which party he voted for in 2019. Till today, the born governorship aspirant, is yet to react to Wike’s allegation of anti-party activities on him.
With the aforesaid, it is very certain that Udoedehe had never voted for the APC at any given election since the return of democracy in 1999. The first time Udoedehe would probably vote for the APC, is if he secures the APC governorship ticket and that is even not certain.
As the acting secretary of the party, Udoedehe used his position to unilaterally appoint the now sacked Austin Ekanem, as chairman of the state chapter of the party from Uyo Senatorial District, having known that the governorship ticket of the party has been zoned to Uyo Senatorial District. That was a grand design by Udoedehe to indirectly prepare grounds for the governorship election outcome to be in favour of Governor Emmanuel’s favoured candidate of the PDP.
Alleging that Akpabio is reaping from where he did not sow since joining the APC, provides a comic relief and indeed laughable. Rather than accuse Akpabio of reaping where he did not sow, we think Udoedehe should thank Akpabio for giving the Akwa Ibom State chapter of the party, which he had over the years destroyed because of his undemocratic tendencies, the needed oxygen to survive since that uncommon movement in 2018.
Akpabio left his comfort zone as the Minority Leader of the Senate to stabilize the National Assembly for President Muhamadu Buhari, when there was a gang up from both chambers of the NASS to frustrate the president. It was Akpabio’s movement that tamed the tide against the president.
Udoedehe should not forget so soon that Akpabio made him a Minister in the government of the late President Umaru Yar’Adua. He should, therefore, not blame Akpabio for his inability to be a team player in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Ministry, as Minister of State, which led to his disgraceful sack, after just Nine months in office.
With this reaction, we advise members and supporters of the APC to discountenance the falsehood and lies churned out by Udoedehe and his ilks, that he was ‘persecuted’ for being Buhari’s supporter. He was never and has never been a supporter of Buhari. What we know about Udoedehe on loyalty and support is that he supports Asiwaju Tinubu in the day and Amaechi at Night.
Signed:
Alhaji Abdulrahman Bello- National President
Comrade Bassey Etim- Secretary)
For National Coalition for Strategic Impact and Unity (NACOSIU)
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