Chief Allen Nwachukwu, the ex-officio member of the PDP, South-east, and immediate past Deputy State Chairman of the PDP in Abia state, has claimed that former Governor Orji Uzo Kalu and others that defected to the APC did so to avoid being probed by the Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government. In this interview with SAM OBINNA IBE, he dismissed them as light weight politicians that lack electoral value. Excerpts:
What is your assessment of the just concluded non-elective convention of your party, the PDP?
That event was marvellous. I thank the PDP governors, members of the BoT, and the National Caretaker Committee chairman, Senator Ahmed Makarfi, and other members for sustaining the party while the leadership tussle lasted. It shows that the PDP remains the hope of Nigerians, who still love the party and rely on it to rescue them from the economic quagmire the country at present is embroiled in under the APC-led national government.
The non-elective convention also shows that PDP will come back to power in 2019. People are hungry and they need a party like the PDP to come and rescue them from the untold hardship they are being subjected to. Let me thank the former President Dr. Goodluck Jonathan for restoring confidence in our great party during the protracted leadership problem.
I also want to thank the judiciary for restoring the hope of the hopeless. Nigerians are reassured that the PDP will right the wrongs if they come back to power in 2019.
The APC says it is battling hard to correct your party’s years of misrule. What is your response to this?
What do you expect them to say? You don’t expect them to praise the PDP or admit that the PDP will defeat them and return to power, do you? When the PDP was in power the economy was good, but look at where APC-led federal government has taken us to. They talk of change and have changed good things to bad. You know what the exchange rate of dollar to naira is. What a bag of rice is now compared to when the PDP was in power, how much a bottle of soft drink is now compared to what it was when the PDP was in power.
A bag of rice was sold at N8, 000 when the PDP was in power but now it costs between N18, 000 to N20, 000. The APC wants to kill Nigerians and the PDP is ready to rescue them. Let the APC tell us one thing they have achieved since they came to power.
People will not make the mistake of voting the APC again at the national level. PDP will win in 2019 because all the corrupt politicians have left the party to the APC to cover up their corrupt acts.
Check the former governors and senators that left the PDP to APC, they left to cover their sins, they were afraid that the federal government will probe them. So they joined the APC to avoid being probed.
Is the PDP not depleted and intimidated by the array of bigwigs in Abia State that have defected to the APC ahead of 2019?
(Former Governor of Abia State, Dr. Orji Uzo Kalu, Chief Ikechi Emenike, Prince BB Apugo, Chief Marc Wabara, Dr. Uche Ogah, Dr. Comrade Chris Akomas, former Deputy Governor, Senator Nkechi Nwaogu, Barrister Emeka Nwaogu, are some of those that have defected).
Who among them ever won any election in the state? I made him, Orji Uzo Kalu, governor. Since I left him, has he ever won any election? Isn’t it a shame that a former governor contested senatorial elections twice and lost in both? What makes him a bigwig in Abia politics if he cannot win a senatorial election on his own?
We recognize Prince B.B. Apugo as a leader and a politician, but he cannot make it possible for the APC to win Abia State. Marc Wabara has not won a councillorship election in his ward in Ukwa East Local Government Area, Chief Ikechi Emenike has never won any election in his life. He had contested the senatorial and governorship elections many times and failed. What about Senator Nkechi Nwaogu? He cannot win election in Osisioma Ngwa L.G.A where people like us are. These people are in the APC to get federal government appointments. I made Barrister Emeka Nwaogu, former Minister of Labour and Productivity, the deputy chairman and later council chairman, Aba South LGA. There are people who will leave the PDP in Abia and the party will collapse, but they are still in the PDP.
Governor Ikpeazu is doing marvellously well and will stay beyond 2019. The PDP made Orji Uzo Kalu governor for 8 years, but when left office in 2007, he wanted to destroy the PDP by forming the PPA. His party won in Abia and Imo States respectively but he could not manage them and subsequently lost both.
In contrast, Senator Ahmed Tinubu controlled only Lagos State but today he controls the whole of the South West. When you talk of politicians that make things happen, Tinubu is one of them and in Abia State, people that make things happen are still in the PDP. Governor Ikpeazu is doing well, the Umuahia-Aba road, the bridge in Arochukwu under construction are projects you cannot believe are state projects. These projects are being constructed where Kalu hails from, the old Bende. Ikpeazu is not a tribalist, he is governor of Abia and not governor of Ukwa Ngwa. Abia people will return Okezie Ikpeazu because they need him. We only pray to God to give him the strength to continue to pilot the state for 8 years.
Those that left PDP for APC left not because they wanted to win election for the party but to cover their sins, get federal appointments and contracts. We hope they will remain in the APC, get contracts and appointments and use the proceeds to join hands to further develop the state.
But critics of the Ikpeazu PDP-led government said that non-payment of workers salary and pension arrears may work against his return in 2019?
It is not true. The governor is working hard to make civil servants smile. If it is their trap it will not work. Governor Ikpeazu was a civil servant, his father was a teacher and mother was a civil servant also, very soon civil servants in the state will smile. Even APC controlled states also owe salaries. Does Imo State not owe salaries? Are they better than Abia?
What is your message to Abians in the face of this scepticism?
I appeal to Abians to support Ikpeazu’s administration. He has spent only two years plus in government and these two years mostly he has been in court fighting for his mandate. Abians should not be taken in by the APC’s propaganda ahead of 2019. Abia State is 95 percent PDP, it will never be APC control state. Those that make things happen in Abia politics are still in PDP today and working hard to still deliver Governor Okezie Ikpeazu come 2019 election.
I, Chief Allen Nwachukwu, am backing the governor. I used the Movement for Abia Re-Union to remove Governor T.A Orji from PPA and handed it to the PDP. It brought back life to PDP in Abia State. And we (PDP) took over Abia State. I, and other tested and experienced politicians did it with our followers, coordinators in the 17 local government areas and we are still intact. None of us has left the PDP.
