The crisis in the All Progressives Congress (APC) may be spiralling out of control following the forced exit of the Secretary of the National Convention Committee, Senator Benjamin Uwajumogu, and his immediate replacement with former Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba.
Asked why he threw in his resignation, Uwajumogu told journalists that the date for the convention co-incided with the graduation ceremonied of his children in the United Kingdom.
Insiders said his fate was sealed by his angry kinsman, Governor Rchas Okorocha of Imo State, who is in a push back against his political foes in the Imo APC.
APC spokesman, Mallam Bolaji Abdulahi, denied that Uwajumogu was traded off to please Okorocha.
His words: “It is not a tradeoff. To the best of my knowledge, the reasons he gave were personal and the National Working Committee NWC has appointed somebody else, Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba. I do not know how that can be a tradeoff because if it is so, I think his replacement should have been another person from Imo but the new appointee is from Cross River”.
A National Working Committee member discountenanced Abdulahi’s position, insisting that the Imo Senator was forced out by the machinations of us state chief executive.
Uwajumogu denied his governor had a hand in his resignation, but added, “As a matter of fact, I am happy now that I have resigned, maybe it will be clear that the Convention which is slated to elect national officers,….I am aware that the governor is supporting some south east citizens to run for offices zoned to the region and so now that I have resigned, nobody will accuse me of manipulating the process”.
“My appointment was by the NWC and nobody has asked me to leave this position. The NWC met yesterday ams there was no where in their meeting where I was asked to resign. It is a decision I made by myself. However, in any decision you take, there must be political consequences”.
On his relationship with his governor, the Senator said: “For me, my relationship with him is not a personal thing. It is something that all of us in Imo state are opposed to the way government in Imo state is being run.
“Our opposition to that is something that is based on principle; based on the fact that 95 percent of Imo citizens and indeed south easterners are not happy with what is happening in Imo state.
“South East citizens are ashamed, that the only state we, APC, have in the region is being run the way it is in the past three years and for me, I did not have a choice than to detach myself from that government.