Jumping from one party to another will diminish Obi’s gains – APGA pioneer chair

Chief Chekwas Okorie,

Founder of the All Progressives Grand Alliance and the pioneer chairman of the party, Chief Chekwas Okorie, shares his thoughts with ADEBAYO FOLORUNSHO-FRANCIS, on the crisis rocking the party, his assessment of Labour Party presidential flag bearer, Peter Obi, among other issues

Aside from refusing to recognise your candidate as APGA chairman, where did you think the Independent National Electoral Commission went wrong?

First of all, the Supreme Court gave an unambiguous judgment on March 24, 2023, when it corrected some errors, it made in its earlier judgment on the All Progressives Grand Alliance leadership and confirmed that Chief Edozie Njoku is the national chairman of APGA elected at the Owerri convention of the party held in 2019.

INEC, being a party to the suit, was also formally served by the bailiff of the Supreme Court. It (INEC) was expected to obey, being the judgment of the highest court of the land. But Prof Mahmood (Yakubu) refused to obey it. The Supreme Court on its own does not enforce its judgment. Instead, the constitution allows any court of record below to enforce the judgment of the Supreme Court.

So, two officers of the National Working Committee of the party went to an FCT High Court at Bwari; Court 40. In the course of the trial, the other faction of the party led by Victor Oye planned to hold a convention, even while the trial to enforce the Supreme Court judgment was ongoing.

The trial court, based on application, gave a clear order that all parties to the suit must maintain status quo ante, meaning that no convention, no meetings, nothing should be held until he had finished with the matter before him. Then, he also included that INEC should not supervise or recognise any action taken by either party.

But these other people ignored the order, and INEC went ahead and supervised that convention and returned the man who now parades himself as the new chairman of APGA as duly elected. So, the same people were in court to file forms 48 and 49 for contempt, and INEC was duly served.

The contempt charge took its full course and the court found Professor Mahmoud and Victor Oye guilty of contempt in early November last year, 2023. In his lenient view, they were given 14 working days to purge themselves of contempt. But the judgment was already clear; they had been found guilty.

The judge said that if they failed to purge themselves of contempt, they would face the full wrath of the law. He then adjourned the matter to November 29 (2023). On the 28th of November, just on the eve of the day the judgment was to be held, Oye and his people got a pronouncement from the Court of Appeal showing that issues had been joined before them, saying that the lower court should not go any further.

Were you surprised by the ruling?

Of course, everybody was stunned. Usually, you cannot arrest a judgment if a matter has been adjourned. You only allow the judgment to go on. But if you are not satisfied, you can now go to appeal. But here, a judgment has been delivered. For the many years I have been around, I have never heard sentencing on a matter that is not of life and death. But this was what happened, and the lower court had no choice but to adjourn the matter sine die waiting to know what the Court of Appeal would do.

What I said now is just a repetition of what I said at that time. Since the INEC chairman had been found guilty of contempt, he had become a contemnor by our law. Contempt of court is a criminal offence. The constitution of the country is also clear that a contemnor is divested of every right to be heard by an appellate court until he has purged himself of contempt.

So, why will a Court of Appeal even entertain an appeal by a contemnor like Oye? As we speak, Mahmood has not even appealed the judgment against him. It is only Oye that that has gone to appeal. What the Court of Appeal did was to adjourn that matter that would have ended on the 29th of September by five months to April. It was that matter adjourned to April that was eventually heard last Monday. What did the court do? The court now adopted the brief of all the parties and adjourned for judgment.

But something happened. We saw a judgment that was unrelated to the leadership of APGA, which was a matter that we had discarded at the trial court that had to do with the recognition of candidates for the 2023 election. We had discarded it because it had nothing to do with the APGA leadership matter. But that matter, surprisingly, surfaced at the Court of Appeal.

Unknown to me and all the litigants, our names appeared as appellants in the Court of Appeal. The judgment against us was given in June and nobody raised the matter. We didn’t even know we had a judgment that was given against that appeal. The funny part of it was that the appeal itself was filed out of time so the Court of Appeal simply struck it out for being statute barred.

I had made a petition to the president of the NBA and the attorney general office before now. Let Nigerians not keep quiet. There’s no other country where a contemnor will continue in office. That was why I made the call. If we want to turn the other eye to a man like Mahmood who is celebrating disobeying orders of the court, including the judgment of the Supreme Court, to get away with it, the ball is in our court. But I will not be accused of not speaking out.

Why is it difficult for elders and stakeholders of APGA to call the two factional chairmen and resolve the issue?

Well, it’s a very good question, especially for the public who has not been following the events. But I can tell you that APGA will go into the Guinness Book of World Records as the political party with the longest leadership dispute in the history of the entire world.

How old is this dispute?

We have had 22 years of leadership disputes. I founded APGA in 2002. In 2004, a leadership crisis broke out. It took me seven years to have a party I initiated its formation to be registered after three attempts. The two previous ones failed. In 2002, the third attempt succeeded, and it was celebrated. I broke an 80-year jinx. No Igbo man ever founded a political party since 1923.

So, the celebration was at home and abroad. But some people wouldn’t allow that party to survive.

I was not even allowed to enjoy my tenure as the chairman. I was barely two years as chairman in 2004 when the crisis erupted. It was led by Victor Umeh and sponsored by Peter Obi. This same Victor Umeh was coming to me to collect transport money to come to Abuja for meetings. But Obi didn’t hide it and apologised to me. He regretted it and confessed that he was misled. I was the one who gave him the nomination and raised his hand at the parade ground.

I was also the one who rehabilitated Ojukwu politically. I brought him into APGA and made him the presidential candidate. I never did it because the intention was not to glorify myself. I thought that the party would give our people a platform for political engagement. That was the purpose. So, I made all the sacrifices and practically brought Ikemba into it. He was not part of the formation.

But many people gave Ikemba Ojukwu the credit for bringing his ideology to APGA. Are you contesting it?

Which ideology? Of course, he wasn’t there when we wrote our manifesto and constitution. The original APGA constitution which is still with INEC contains all of the things we talk about from self-determination, federalism, and resource control to the objective principles of the party. They are all documented out there. There is no way you can register a party without first submitting your party manifesto and constitution.

Ikemba joined the party in January 2003. That was two or three days before we gave him the nomination. His membership card is there. I remember raising his hand and handing him the flag on the 10th of January. He became our de facto leader because I was not supposed to be. Ojukwu had been somebody I had always followed with utmost respect right from the time he returned from exile.

Is APGA also seeking to join the rumoured merger with LP and PDP?

Let me first clear this. I am no longer the chairman. However, I still have the moral authority to speak for all of us in APGA because it is something we have discussed over time. APGA will not go into a merger with any party. But we believe in constructive engagement. APGA can go for alliance, accord, and coalition without losing its identity. That is what the party will stand for.

When we founded APGA, it was Zik’s (late Nnamdi Azikiwe) political philosophy of constructive engagement that we followed.

Did the crisis in APGA stop after you threw in the towel?

No way! As I left, that crisis did not stop. It continued with Edozie Njoku this time going for the office of chairman and they began to fight him. We have had three governors since APGA was founded. What happened is that every governor spent all the money he could spend to retain APGA in Anambra State. That is why, outside me, no person who is not from Anambra State has been the chairman of APGA and has not been a lackey of the governor.

I think Umeh comes from the same village as Peter Obi. They are from the same Agulu. That is the young man who probably was in secondary school when APGA was founded. That was the person that Soludo made the chairman. So, every governor that comes puts APGA into his pocket and that is why in 22 years APGA has not grown beyond Anambra State. It is only by the special grace of God that APGA has not gone extinct.

Is that probably why many people still perceive APGA as an Anambra State party?

It is a big shame. Even in Anambra State, it is a party that every local government is now in control. When Peter Obi was there, they derisively called it the Agulu People’s General Assembly. During Obiano’s time, they changed it to Aguleri People’s General Assembly to also reflect where he hails from. Now, it is the Aguata People’s General Assembly. That is Soludo’s village. So, you can see how APGA has been ridiculed.

 What is your relationship with Obi after the alleged betrayal? Is he still someone you can trust?

As I earlier said, I hold no grudge against Peter Obi. We have made up since. I am so proud of Peter’s phenomenal rise in national politics. He has graduated from being a state champion to playing at the national level. Though we are not in the same party, I still beat my chest I gave him political exposure. If I had not insisted on giving him the nomination, because others were contesting for that office, he wouldn’t have had that exposure as governor of Anambra State for two terms. He would probably not have had something to use as evidence of our capacity to launch himself at the center.

Do you foresee Obi dumping his party for the PDP?

Honestly, this question may warrant charging a consultancy fee. But I can give it to you for free. I think Obi will be better off engaging the PDP. But they should be more interested in getting LP to come together so that they can continue with that. This is because at this level, jumping from party to party will diminish a lot of his gains. If he can retain the Labour Party, I can see the 2027 election coming out in a manner that will no longer be a winner-takes-all.

What’s your view on Tinubu’s first year in office?

I like to be very charitable here. President Bola Tinubu inherited a very difficult economic situation and also had his hands a little bit tied being in the same party that served eight years before his coming. So, he chose to take certain bold steps without spending too much time apportioning blame. Those steps are very unpalatable. I am a very optimistic person naturally. I see that the future is bright, and it’s painful now. Any person who says he’s not feeling the pain is living in denial.

But the only thing I would want to advise President Tinubu on is that both himself and the National Assembly should, at least for goodness sake, cut down on certain ostentation and lavish lifestyle of those who are the head of government. The way the lawmakers and ministers parade themselves through our common patrimony is very offensive. They are not being sensitive to the feelings of, or responsive to the sensitivities of the people. I will add that some of his ministers within one year have not done too well. I have not seen what has happened in the area of agriculture. Now this is the rainy season. In the next one or two months, by August, we’ll be expecting new harvests. I have not seen where those harvests are going to come from. So, in agriculture, much is expected.

Will you say the country is in safe hands?

I believe Nigeria is in safe hands because we are in such a situation where any feeble-minded president would have thrown up his hands and surrendered. But this is a man who is politically astute, and courageous. He is taking steps that I admire. The only grey area that I need to mention is that he is unfortunately drifting in the direction of President (Muhammadu) Buhari in terms of nepotism. That is not so good for general perception.