RE: Behind the Demise of Ebonyi PDP
The attention of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Ebonyi State Chapter has been drawn to an article published in an Abakaliki based tabloid with the title “Behind the Demise of Ebonyi PDP written with a fictitious name. Looking at the name, it will immediately become obvious that the sponsors of the said article were not even convinced that the content was true hence the use of fictitious and laughable name as “Halima Achi” to sign it off.
However, for the benefit of the unsuspecting public and our teeming party supporters we shall respond as follows:
Let us begin with the events before the actual governorship primary election of the PDP in Ebonyi in 2022. Quite long before the sales of the PDP forms, a zoning committee was constituted by the then caretaker committee of the party led by the late Elder Fred Udeogu and the chairman of that zoning committee was Senator Obinna Ogba who was at the time a serving Senator representing Ebonyi Central zone at the Senate. Of course, the governorship of the party started with the Ebonyi North zone with Sen. Dr Sam Egwu as Governor under PDP from 1999-2007. After his tenures, the ticket went to Ebonyi Central with Chief Martin Elechi as Governor on the platform of PDP from 2007-2015. Eight years after, the ticket went to Ebonyi South under a tempestuous circumstance and the candidate was Engr David Umahi who served from 2015-2023. All of these happened under PDP as the party remains the umbrella under which the state and people have refuge anytime, any day. As the eight year tenure of Umahi drew to an end in 2023, the convention in PDP was that the ticket should go to Ebonyi North where it began earlier. Obinna Ogba coming from Ebonyi Central and being the chairman of the zoning committee couldn’t punctuate that due process with outright adoption of Ebonyi North as the zone the ticket should go to.
He instead threw it open because he was intending to pick the ticket. All the caution we raised at the time fell on deaf ears. Obinna muscled up the process and announced that the ticket should go to the Abakaliki bloc, a political concept unknown to the PDP and Ebonyi State in particular. We have three zones in the state: North, South and Central. There’s no such a thing as Abakaliki bloc. It doesn’t exist and has never been a yardstick for selecting who governs the state. But to accommodate himself in the equation, Obinna jettisoned the convention. That was the day the struggle for the soul of the party’s gubernatorial ticket started.
Going forward, Obinna Ogba started aligning and buying up most of the major stakeholders of the party to align with his zoning school of thought. He was able to buy up Sen. Anyim Pius Anyim who was at the time nurturing presidential ambition. Obinna also moved and started polarising the circus of Ebonyi North. He sponsored some party members from the zone to purchase governorship forms and he eventually succeeded in dividing the stakeholders of the zone who then started discarding the idea of ceding the ticket to North.
Sen. Ogba and his acolytes began manifesting their hitherto hidden ambition towards the ticket. It was as if the party had become a personal estate to some cartels under same umbrella. It was manifestly then believed that the ticket was no longer an exclusive reserve of the North, but an open market into which anyone can go and pick whatever pleased them. Knowing the scorecards of the desperate aspirants as they were at the time, many stakeholders and party members started agitating that High Chief Ifeanyi Odii should come to the rescue as someone who’s could unite the party in addition to his legendary records of philanthropy, transparency, due diligence, humility and accessibility over the years as a business mogul.
Before the call for him to join the race, Chief Ifeanyi Odii had advocated that Ebonyi North be allowed to pick the ticket without hassles. Sen. Obinna Ogba and his men again flayed up and insisted that the ticket should be thrown open to Abakaliki bloc. They began sponsoring some malicious articles such as this one under review against Chief Odii and his supporters. At no time did Chief Odii reply any of their several diatribes and lies against his person. What then miffed the entire circumstance was the willful collapse of the Ebonyi North’s power structure within the PDP into the structure of Ogba. The scenario irked many stakeholders from South and Central zones. The call for the intervention of Chief Odii heightened since it had become apparent that the North wasn’t ready to make case for themselves at that point in time.
Chief Odii then decided that he should oblige the clarion calls. And after dues consultation with the stakeholders of the both districts, he decided to declare his intention to join the race. The joyous members of the party in the state came together and shouldered the cost of the forms. His campaign train landed and took off so interestingly.
Anyichuks as he is fondly addressed became the refuge for the many who didn’t have trust in the possible candidacy of the other force. The journey intensified and became a national movement. The only people opposed to the call to Chief Odii to come liberate the party were only the committed acolytes of Sen. Obinna Ogba. Along the line when the chips were down, many had to quit the enclave for the Odozi Obodo’s (Chief Odii). This further caused the force and its co-travellers revulsive spleen. They became belligerent about the whole process, committing so much to campaign of calumny. While they were doing that, Odii was busy reaching out to the stakeholders of the party both locally and nationally. His popularity became an academic discipline. Joy rented the air, and the people were indeed rejoicing. Ogba and his minions became agitated, resorting to calumny and brazen diatribe.
The National Working Committee of our great party scheduled primary election. The date for the governorship primary election in Ebonyi was known and accepted by everyone except one man who had already seen himself as a statutory governor. He decided to boycott the primary. He premised his boycott on the ground of negotiating a different date and venue with the same NWC which had given allocated date and time for PDP governorship primaries across Nigeria, including Ebonyi State.
The primary election came to pass with Chief Odii emerging the gubernatorial candidate of the party. The other people went haywire, threatening thunder and lightning. The courts of the land in their wisdom and in accordance with the guidelines of the party over the schedule of the primary election affirmed the candidacy of High Chief Ifeanyi Odii. The other people and their wolfish folks immediately constituted themselves into a reproach to the PDP, attacking everyone at sight in the party. They openly declared support for the APC in Ebonyi State with Sen. Anyim Pius Anyim leading the amorphous group of disgruntled party members. What they celebrate today as victory for the APC against the PDP in Ebonyi State is what’s known to everyone as sham.
The matter is already the Ebonyi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal currently sitting in Abuja.
Back to the allegations raised in the hideous article, it’s here pertinent to say that if anyone was desperate about the ticket, it was Sen. Obinna Ogba, the sponsor of all the media attacks on Chief Odii. The paragraphs above explained how. Was it the turn of Ebonyi Central to produce governorship candidate of the PDP? The answer is no! Why then did Obinna Ogba declare himself a defacto ticket bearer long before the primary election of the party? Only brazen desperation could cause that. Talking about bribing party leadership at state and national, it’s worthy of note that it was Ogba and his foot soldiers that started dollarising the process.
We know how much he often brandished before anyone he felt had the wherewithal to push him towards securing the ticket. He was the first to start sharing cars to party state working committee members.
The truth is that PDP in Ebonyi State is a united house whose foundation remains solid. Even as Sen. Ogba and his supporters have left the party for the APC, the party remains solit=d and the most popular party in Ebonyi State today and tomorrow.
PDP in Ebonyi State is intact. The exit of its elite traducers rather paved the way to separate the goats from the sheep. The party is very happy that the agents of distraction and destruction have excused themselves from the system. The party can now breathe. However, it’s instructive to plead that these individuals focus on their newfound abode and stop sponsoring spurious articles against dear party, the PDP and its faithful members including the governorship candidate, High Chief Ifeanyi Odii, the Odozi Obodo one of Ebonyi State!
Nwoba Chika Nwoba is the Publicity Secretary of PDP in Ebonyi State.