The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Delta has said that its Governorship Candidate in the March 18 election, Sen. Ovie Omo-Agege, did not in any way factionalise the party.
The statement issued on Thursday in Asaba by Mr Ima Niboro, the Director of Communications and Media Strategy of Delta APC Campaign Organisation, stated that the allegation against Omo-Agege by the expelled chieftain of the party, Dr Cairo Ojougboh, was not true.
According to him, the allegation that the governorship hopeful did not carry everybody along, hence the party lost the election in Delta was “a tissue of lies”.
NAN recall that Delta APC had on Monday expelled Ojougboh over alleged anti-party activities.
Niboro explained that prior to the 2019 elections, Ojougboh chose Omo-Agege and Chief Great Ogboru faction of the APC to contest the governorship primary election of the party because he believed it was the winning side.
He further stated that it was only after he lost that he began to wage a war against Omo-Agege.
Niboro explained that in 2019, the party had two factions, one led by the founding leader in Delta, Chief Otega Emerhor, and the other led by Omo-Agege and Ogboru.
He stated thst APC had two factions – the mainstream APC, led by Olorogun Emerhor, and the faction that was led by Sen. Omo-Agege and Chief Great Ogboru – before it later closed ranks.
”I happened to be with the Emerhor faction.
“In fact, I ran for the House of Representatives, Emerhor ran for the Senate, but because of the crisis we were outmaneuvered and we lost.
“But Emerhor, myself and two others I will not name, sat down and took a deliberate decision that we were not going to throw away the baby with the bath water and that we were going to put the party together.
”The other two didn’t agree and they quit the party.
“But I stood with Emerhor because he and I had agreed on our direction even before we invited the other two persons.
“That was how the process started and the APC came together and today we are one big happy family.
“However, Ojougboh was with us in 2019.
“In fact, our faction needed a candidate for governorship, who is from Delta North,” Niboro added.
He stated that Ojougboh became the candidate for the mainstream APC because it did not support Ogboru.
“We wanted equity, that looks we have accepted rotation of power in Delta.
”It was the turn of Delta North and the next governor to come in to complete the remaining four years of the Ifeanyi Okowa’s administration.
“And, if we are to get him out, such a person should come from his own place, Delta North, so that in 2023, which is now upon us, we can confidently back an Urhobo, Delta Central person.
“But in the morning of the primaries, Ojougboh called to say he was joining the Omo-Agege side to contest the governorship primary and that’s what he did.
”So, he willingly joined the Omo-Agege faction then, and it was only after he lost that he started this long talk about Omo-Agege factionalising the party,” Niboro added.
He contended that APC lost the governorship poll because it believed in the inpregnability of the BVAS, unknown to it that it could be manipulated to upload fake results into the IRev.
He stated: “Some of us still had basic trust in the human character, not believing that they would ever attempt to tamper with something so transparent as the BVAS.
“In my local government, at the end of collation, they gave APC 15,620 votes and PDP 15,613 votes, a difference of seven votes.
“I sat down and calculated the figures that were right there on the final result sheets.
”I discovered that what PDP actually scored was 14,513 votes, so they undermined 1,100 votes right on the result sheet and declared it and this is how they ‘won’ their so called 21 local government areas.
“So, we need now to go and verify the results they claim gave them this dubious, fake victory,” Niboro added.
He further explained that APC promptly petitioned INEC about the infraction and other observations and requested it to review the results, but it refused.
“Thus, the INEC position as to the declaration of the disputed result has to be tested in court,” he maintained.
According to him, what happened in Delta on March 18 was an electoral heist.
He gave assurance that the court would definitely give judgement to APC and overturn the INEC position because, “we have evidence to prove that the election was a sham.” (NAN)
