Facts emerged on Friday that the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is behind the desire to register the controversial “African Peoples Congress,” as the “new party" mistakenly issued a statement in Abuja today using the email address of the ruling party.
Already, one Mr. Thomas Ibu, the PDP official in charge of the PDP Internet is being queried for the "national embarrassment" the mismanaged ruse has caused the party.The statement was sent to reporters officially accredited to cover the PDP. It was copied to almost all the officials of the party, including its National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, as well as party officials who work with Metuh in the Publicity Department, such as Keneth Gyado and Nwachukwu Ngige.
Metuh and those working with him in his department are said to be the brains behind the new “party.”
The bogus APC was hurriedly put together to thwart the efforts of the opposition, who have come together under the All Progressive Congress, from being registered by the Independent National Electoral Commission.
A member of the party's National Working Committee said the Presidency, which is laboring under heavy national and international lampooning following the pardon granted convicted former governor Dipreye Alamieyesegha, was fuming with anger over the new embarrassment.
"This is an operation we ought to carry out cleanly, without letting the world know that we are ones behind the new party. But the bubble has burst now with this silly mistake. Too bad," the NWC member said.
In the email titled, "EMERGENCY PRESS RELEASE", the PDP appendix APC raised the alarm that its members were being “threatened.”
Full text of the statement:
The African People’s Congress has uncovered plots by some faceless persons believed to be inspired by desperate elements in the so-called merger group to attack and possibly eliminate key officers of the African People’s Congress (APC).
This came to light barely twenty four hours after APC, its National Headquarters, logo, manifesto and constitution were unveiled to Nigerians and indeed Africa.
After the elaborate event and appraisal meetings and stakeholders’ interactions that followed at the National headquarters, most officers of the party left the secretariat late yesterday. At about 10.15pm when an officer of the party, Hon Dan Iloabanafo and some administrative staff were getting ready to close the Secretariat for the day, two men came round the backside of the office claiming they wanted to register as members of the party, a feature that has become common place in the secretariat, but Iloabanafo advised them to come back the next day or any other week day. The hoodlums insisted they preferred to be registered immediately, and while the party officer was trying to explain things to them, they pulled out guns and demanded the whereabouts of the Acting Chairman who had left the Secretariat earlier.
After moving from one office to the other and satisfying themselves that the Acting Chairman was not in the office, the gunmen left ,muttering words that were barely audible but suggested that there were other highly placed persons complicit in the plot but preferred to be kept out of the plot.
Against this backdrop, the APC wishes to reiterate that no amount of intimidation or harassment can deter it from pursuing its lofty goals and aspirations in the interest of the good people of Nigeria.
We are too busy to engage in hollow exchanges as initiated yesterday by Chief Tom Ikimi, who fruitless shopped for excuses, claims and assertions to justify their failures and political inadequacies.
As the “assemblage of windpipes” which the merger group represents, Ikimi rushed off to the press on learning of the unveiling of the APC and our firmness of purpose; to ventilate a most pedestrian assertion’ such that can only be expected of school-age children or demented teenagers.
As their helter-skelter search for means to undermine the APC continues, we wish to alert Nigerians of their grand plot of smuggling a back-dated application for registration into the INEC, an action that could plunge Nigerian democracy into the woods of lawlessness. For APC, that is most unacceptable.
It is indeed pathetic that same people that claim to pursue the deepening of democracy cannot abide by the letters of the constitution and due process.
While the merger racketeers continue to fiddle, the APC leadership would be paying a visit to the victims of the Madallabomb blast this weekend as an expression of our people-centred objectives.
In anticipation of the issuance of our certificate of registration, a meeting of National Officers of the party would hold at the party headquarters next week to commence mobilisation and sensitization of Nigerians preparatory to the launching of our about to be registered party.
Signed: Barr. Sa’id Balogun, Ag. National Secretary
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