THE IMPERATIVE OF MOVING THE LABOUR PARTY FORWARD.
The 4th of September meeting of the political gladiators of the Obidients family of Labour Party to chart a new way forward for the crises leaden party was timeous and also much expected.
It was time for the Obidients family in the party to step out and step up its game. It was also one meeting that cast a glimmer of hope to the increasingly hopeless masses who strongly believe that Obidients movement should never be allowed the golgotha experience. Obidients must receive life by fire and by force.
In the meeting were His Excellency, Peter Gregory Obi, His Excellency Yusuf Baba Ahmed, His Excellency Dr. Alex Otti, His Excellency Rhodes Vivour, and many party chieftains and gladiators ; Athan Achonu, Nenadi Usman, Ikechukwu Emetu, Hon. Obi Aguocha, Hon. Ibe Okwara Osonwa, Dr. Yunusa Tanko and many others. These men represents the leading lights and what is today captioned in the local political lexicon as party elders and leaders of last resort who are called upon to invoke a political force majure to determine the Party’s future.
The imperative to invoke a doctrine of necessity in such high profile gathering is both politically historical and morally episcopal. The circumstances that created the room for leadership degeneracy and failure in the party has given rise to calls for intervention to halt the drift of the Party into oblivion. Something had to happen, something had to give to save the party from self distruct.
It is important first of all to prove that the party has what it takes and the who’s who to rescue itself from downward spiral and to start the rebuilding process towards 2027. The race to 2027 has taken a dynamic crescendo and so the terrain must be opened for men with character and lion heartedness to survive the ferocious political jungle. It is a game for the sterner beings and not for the charlatans or who you may dub the political comedians.
Most of us Obidients that found ourselves locked up in the precarious prebendal politricks of Julius Abure and his illegal Exco had watched in resigned hope and despair at the speed with which he eroded the political goodwill amassed for the party during the 2023 elections. Abure and his political barbarians gravely mismanaged the sweat and blood of Nigerians which was freely gifted to the party by the Obidients movement.
We watched in frustration at the macabre dance of “gwo gwo gwo ngwo” by Abure and the ‘ifa high priest’, Apapa factions of Labour Party which dealt a serious blow on the political fortunes of Peter Obi and the Obidients movement during the 2023 elections.
Abure resorted to multiple illegality, unconstitutionality and organizing illegitimate Convention not authorized by INEC to announce himself winner. Abure out of desperation trampled his own Party’s constitution in order to execute his sit tight plans. He forgot that the power he sought to monopolize and usurp was borrowed from the Obidients family that gave LP governor and many legislative seats.
Abure assumed the position of an emperor in the party and cast the Obidients under the moving bus. He hand selected political minions and misfits as NWC Exco members most of whom lack the political experience or intellectual carriage to manage the enormous powers donated to Labour Party by the Obidients family.
Abure descended on party funds, embezzling monies without accountability and in the process tainted the integrity and frugal image of the person of Peter Obi and what he represents in our new Nigeria political elixir. Abure was just a disaster and only time awaited his disgraceful exit.
It is ironical to many of us watchers of the unfolding events of the Labour Party what is now playing out where even their two factions are now settling their hitherto irreconcilable differences to merge forces to fight the newly announced Caretaker Committee headed by Nenadi Usman. They are now calling her all manner of names to bring the Caretaker Committee into disrepute.
The picture is gradually unfolding that the vicious fights between the Apapa and Abure factions of Labour Party had been all along a ruse to deceive the unsuspecting public. The creation of the Caretaker Committee has given rise to the political vacillation of the two factions which however are unworthy of public trust.
While we celebrate with gleeful relish the requiem mass of Abure and his treacherous bandits in power, it will not be lost in us the immoral opportunism brought about by sleazy political characters like Julius Abure and his cohorts in the manner they dashed the hope of Nigerians seeking to push true leaders into office by mass action.
Julius Abure and cohorts represents a cruel spot in our evolutionary political history of the tendency to build a better society. As he and his co-travellers and sponsors engages the next stages of their treacherous journey against the people at the courts, they will be forced to eat from their bitter pills they served Nigerians who trusted them with everything. They will move from court to court looking for the power they’ve just lost till all the monies they embezzled are forcefully dis-gouged from their intestinal membranes.
The usual concoction that the constitution of the party does not provide for Caretaker Committee is purely an academic submission since the non recognition of the Abure NWC by INEC has thrown the party into a lacuna of power vacuum with no recognizable leadership, a situation that makes it imperative to power a CaretakerCommittee.
Under these circumstances, the leader of the party automatically becomes the highest elected member of the Party which position is automatically bequeathed on Dr. Alex Otti. Dr Alex Otti’s consequential powers includes his invocation of the ‘doctrine of necessity’ to power the creation of a Caretaker Committee. Now is the time for the party to truly move forward after shedding itself of treacherous political inertia of the duo of Alhaji Apapa and Julius Abure.
The Labour Party is now finally freed and at liberty to be truly controlled by the Obidients movement. It is indeed party time.
Dr. Engr Odo Ijere.
