Enugu APC: Still struggling with leadership struggle amid discord for Tinubu campaign fund

Nigerians were recently surprised when the All Progressives Congress (APC) gubernatorial candidate in Enugu State, Chief Uche Nnaji, said the state branch would not need from the campaign fund of the party's presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.

Nnaji boasted that the state section of the party would raise resources to continue the election campaign, lamenting that "the current controversy in Enugu APC is about Tinubu's campaign money".

Speaking at a meeting of emergence stakeholders at the party's southeast zone office last Sunday, Nnaji, who was part of the New People's Democratic Party (nPDP) that joined the APC , urged that Tinubu's campaign funds be withheld until after the election. He said the suggestion has become imperative to ensure that the campaign fund does not become a source of dislocation for APC in the state, adding, "By the special grace of God, we will use the resources of Enugu APC to finance the election in 2023 and after the election the party will reimburse us It is Tinubu's money that is causing the crisis of Enugu APC Nnaji regretted that throughout the time that he and the State Chairman, Ugochukwu Agballah, alongside other party loyalists, visited all 184 wards in 204 communities among the 17 state council areas, none of the Abuja-based actors wanted to participate./ p> The gubernatorial candidate was referring to the call by some prominent state APC stakeholders for the removal of Agballah as the party's state chairman. Nnaji claimed it was Agballah who revived APC in Enugu State from its comatose state, even as he urged stakeholders to return home and help grow the party. Recall that on August 30, notable party leaders in Enugu State including Foreign Minister Geoffrey Onyeama, former Senate Speaker Dr. Ken Nnamani, Chief Executive of Voice of Nigeria (DG , VON) Mr. Osita Okechukwu, the former senatorial aspirant, Chief Gbazuagu Nweke Gbazuagu, among others, visited the national secretariat of the APC. The stakeholders, who were received by the APC National Chairman, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, and other members of the National Working Committee (NWC), pleaded with the APC national leaders to remove Agballah from the Presidency of Enugu State. They accused the state president of "appropriating the party in the state as personal property alongside other leaders." Although APC governorship flag bearer Nnaji dismissed the stakeholder visit to the party's national secretariat as ill-conceived, The Guardian's investigation found that the division in Enugu APC predated to the run-up to the 2023 poll. There had been mutual antagonism between old members and new entrants to the party, especially as older party members were annoyed by Agballah's emergence as a state president through the Option A4 open voting system at the state convention four months ago. Coming from the divide, most of the actors distanced themselves from party management, just as they claimed that Agballah listened to his voice and that of a few people outside the state. Nnaji alluded to the division when he said that “leaders who want Agballah removed weren't even paying for their ward offices in communities. Now we have come to make the system work again and they want to take us out. Our leaders are doing well and deserve all the support they need. No other party can embark on the kind of tour we embarked on. But, dismissing the allusion to campaign management and finance as the basis of the disagreement, Mr Gabriel Onoh, the eldest son of former Anambra State Governor Chief Christian Onoh, blamed the crisis to the activities of desperadoes and political mercenaries. But, recounting the genesis of the crisis within the party, Mr Onoh revealed that what most fighters would not tell anyone was how the power struggle for the APC's structure began, adding barely had former Governor Sullivan Chime joined the party. that the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Geoffrey Onyeama ambushed him. “Here is the background: Governor Sullivan Chime is leaving the PDP for APC, disappointed in his successor, Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi. Upon his arrival, he very quickly came up against a clandestine opposition led by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama. Onoh explained that upon his arrival, Chime claimed that the party constitution conferred on him the title of party leader as a former governor, pointing out that Onyeama's counter-argument that the clause only applies to former APC governors sparked the power struggle. “So he, Minister Onyeama, said he was the boss, which consequently set up a battle royale. Keep in mind that the reason the minister wanted former Governor Chime to leave the city...