Gentlemen of the Press,
This press conference is a direct response to the anxiety and concerns members of our great Party, the public and particularly the media have expressed privately and, sometimes, publicly over the resignations of some Party members in the past two weeks or so. We consider that our stakeholders, sympathizers, well-wishers and the general public deserve honest clarification on the development.
To start with, we believe that movements of politicians in and out of political parties in Nigeria have become part of the political culture of politicians especially towards the end of every election cycle. It cuts across all political parties.
Recently, a few members of our Party in Rivers State resigned their membership of the Party. It is very pertinent to state that the persons that resigned belong to two categories. The first is made up of a few persons who either resigned to pursue other interests in life or exercised their right of free association by seeking greener political pastures elsewhere. To these persons, we acknowledge the contributions of some of them to the Party and wish them well in their future endeavours.
However, it has also come to our notice that a few persons that are loyal to Senator Magnus Abe have also resigned recently. These are individuals who have, for the past couple of years, spoken and acted in every way to destroy the APC in Rivers State. Led by Abe, these persons tried all they could to factionalize our Party in the State. They connived endlessly with the governor of Rivers State and used some elements in the State Judiciary to frustrate and destroy our Party through needless litigations. The culmination of their evil machinations was the exclusion of Rivers APC from the ballot in 2019. Evidence exists how Senator Abe and his lieutenants broke into celebration the day the Party was excluded by the court from participating in that election due to their litigation.
After the 2019 unfortunate development, Abe continued to receive support from outside the State and persisted in undermining Rivers APC through every imaginable means principally through frivolous litigation executed through his proxies. At a time, they attacked and completely destroyed the then Rivers APC Secretariat at Forces Avenue, Old GRA, Port Harcourt. Recently, they also hired hoodlums and attempted to destroy the present Secretariat of the Party.
Tired of Abe’s antics, majority of his supporters openly joined the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the State while others found their way back to the mainstream of the Party. However, it recently came to our attention that Senator Abe and the few persons still with him had concluded plans to join the Social Democratic Party (SDP) on whose platform Abe will run for governor, hence their persistent hype to the effect that Abe will be on the ballot come 2023.
In what appears to be a carefully planned exit plan, close associates of Abe started resigning from the APC and making heavy weather of their exit in the social media as part of their exit plan as though they have been functional members of the Party, just to hoodwink the public.
This press conference is essentially to explain to you and the public that Rivers APC considers the formal exit of Abe and his associates from the APC as good riddance. We liken it to a successful excision of a debilitating cancer from the body. Rivers APC can now heave a sigh of relief from the sustained destabilizing onslaught by Senator Abe. We wish him well as he joins the SDP. We pray that he takes everything he exhibited in APC particularly his nuisance value to his new party so that the world would see him for who he truly is.
We make bold to state without an iota of doubt that Senator Abe and his supporters had, by their actions and utterances, long ceased to be functional members of APC. They shunned and refused to participate in the Membership Revalidation exercise that was carried out nationwide by the Party. They also abstained from other legitimate activities of the Party, making their recent purported resignation a mere formality and part of their face-saving exit strategy aimed at deceiving the public.
We appreciate your understanding that there is no blanket exit or exodus of well-meaning members of Rivers APC. We believe that you and the public would appreciate that our Party is, by far, better off without Abe and his motley supporters.
Be informed that an ongoing process of reconciliation led by the Party Special Contact Committee is proceeding apace. The outcome of the good job the Committee is undertaking will be concluded early enough for us to consolidate and kick off campaigns in September.
Rivers APC is glad to, once again, emphasize that we were very careful to ensure that the Party conformed to the Electoral Act 2022, Party rules and regulations, and the Nigerian Constitution all through the various congresses and primaries that culminated in the emergence of the governorship Candidate for our dear Party, Arc. Tonye Patrick Cole, mni In spite of being an established and successful Entrepreneur and Philanthropist, he recently attended the University of Oxford and, on graduation, was inducted into the prestigious Transformational Leadership Fellowship of Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government. Hope you all would agree that he is well-equipped for the task ahead to redeem, recover and turnaround our beloved Rivers State.
This press conference cannot be complete without using this medium to call on all well-meaning members of APC in Rivers State, particularly the energetic youth who have sacrificed their future and destinies in the past seven years to the sustenance and wellbeing of our dear Party, to see the evolving situation as a clarion call on them to step out and step in to provide the much needed support, direction and energy that will ensure victory for our Party come 2023. Your focus should be unwavering and aimed at taking full charge of your various units in the State. This is critical to ensuring success in the 2023 general elections and subsequent elections.
Let me use this opportunity to raise the alarm that just yesterday, evil people launched fake news concerning our leader, Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi purporting that he has resigned from the APC. This is a lie taken from the very abyss of hell. Kindly ignore it and any such fake news that may be concocted and circulated in the media particularly the social media to smear the former Minister of Transportation. He remains a loyal member of the APC and he has re-iterated this at every opportunity and that he would work to ensure the Party resoundingly wins the 2023 elections.
Finally, we express our profound appreciation to you, the press, for not lending yourselves and your platforms for the propagation of fake news and other mischief against our Party, leaders and members. We want to emphatically state, for the umpteenth time, that well-meaning members of Rivers APC are intact. What you might have seen recently is the usual self-cleansing mechanism of the Party at work.
Thank you.
Senibo Chris Finebone
State Publicity Secretary
20th July, 2022
