The ruling All Progressives Grand Alliance, or APGA, is in turmoil ahead of Anambra State’s local government elections.
It should be noted that the Anambra State Independent Electoral Commission (ANSIEC) has finally announced its readiness to hold the much-anticipated local government elections.
The election will be held for the first time in ten years, following the previous one handled by former governor Peter Obi.
Indigenes of the state have long desired Local Government elections, urging successive governors to hold them in order to provide a sense of belonging to the people at the grassroots.
The exercise is scheduled for September 28.
Various political parties have expressed concerns regarding the election’s timeliness.
Most political parties, including the Labour Party (LP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC), have complained about the procedure.
While some parties have pledged to boycott the process, others are already considering taking the state administration to court.
Meanwhile, the state’s ruling party, the APGA, is in a serious crisis.
The party’s two key challenges in the run-up to the election are factionalism and a crisis of disenfranchisement of potential candidates.
The Edozie Njoku group of the APGA, citing a Supreme Court verdict, has maintained to claim to be the party’s legitimate faction.
The faction has established a separate state party secretariat in Anambra, apart from the section loyal to Governor Chukwuma Soludo and Barr Sly Ezeokenwa, national chairman.
The party secretariat at Udoka Housing Estate has been brimming with party veterans who intend to run for the positions of local government chairmen and councillors, as they were spotted arriving to pick up their forms.
Hon Tony Ezekwelu informed journalists in an interview that their forms were in great demand since everyone knows they are the party’s legitimate faction right now.
Regardless, the faction commanded by Ezeokenwa has also sold its forms.
In a surprising turn of events, the state authorities acted against the faction after sensing its popularity.
According to reports, on Wednesday of last week, Anambra State government officers locked down the faction’s offices. They stated that it was a residential structure and not intended for political purposes.
Ezekwelu, who represents the party’s Njoku faction, spoke with journalists and expressed concern about the sealing of their office.
He accused the Anambra state government, led by the APGA, of intimidating them.
He stated, “We arrived here this morning, and people were going about their usual business, including purchasing expression of interest forms for the upcoming local government election, when a crew from Anambra Housing Development Corporation arrived and locked up our office at 10 a.m.
“Luckily, I was here in Anambra State because I have been around on official duties to monitor the sale of expression of interest form.
“When we asked them why, they said it’s an order from above and that the reason was that this place was originally meant to be a residential area and we converted it to party secretariat.
“This place has always been used for party business and we are just the recent people using this.
“Too many politicians have used this place and we are not the owners of this property, so we have reached out to the owner of the property.
“We know that this is political and the intention was just to intimidate us, so we told them not to obstruct them, but to allow them to do their duties.
“We are law-abiding people. We were not served any eviction notice. We came in here just two months ago and no one wrote to us. We view this as an act of intimidation and suppression. This is impunity.”
In the most recent development, it has been reported that the Sly Ezeokenwa section of the party has prohibited prospective hopefuls from purchasing election forms.
It was learned that because to the potential for rancour in conducting primary elections for aspirants, the party chose to print only 21 forms for local government chairmanship candidates in each of the 21 local governments.
According to a source, the forms were distributed to all 21 Local Government Area chairmen of transition committees who were recently sworn in by the Governor.
The chairmen, together with their supervisory councillors, will immediately become the party’s chairmanship and councillorship candidates.
Interested candidates for local government leadership complained that they were banned from running.
peaking on the condition of anonymity, one of them said: “The same day they announced the commencement of sale of form in the party was the same day it was allocated to all the transition committee chairmen, leaving everyone else who has interest to contest in the cold.
“We are not happy about what is happening in the party because this is not the kind of democracy we anticipated.”
Meanwhile, the state governor, Prof Soludo, does not appear to consider the problem as serious.
He framed it as a simple family misunderstanding that would be resolved shortly.
Soludo recently told journalists: “The people of Anambra appear to have concluded that the APGA is the party for the state.
“It is no longer those years of burning down buildings and turmoil, Anambra is now stable because of APGA.
“That has been the reason for the progress we have witnessed here, and Anambra seems to have come to a consensus that APGA is the party to develop Anambra.
“Under our leadership, APGA has never been stronger than what it is today. You asked this question about the crisis because of the things you see in the media, about our party, but I know that things like these are normal during the run up to the election.
“I know someone else is claiming that he is the national chairman and that is through court order, and I haven’t seen that court order myself.
“This is just a family problem that will be sorted out soon and sooner than later, everyone will come into the same big tent.
“I don’t see any division in APGA. I understand the disputants are in court and hopefully, they will resolve soon and I hope that after that, two of them will come into this tent.
“APGA is a movement that has been used for transformations and I can tell you that APGA has never been stronger than now.”
