Orji Uzor Kalu
By Chuks Okocha in Abuja
Like what is happening to the former governor of Abia State, Orji Uzor Kalu, stakeholders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Benue State have risen in strong opposition to the attempt by a defeated Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) senatorial candidate for Benue South in the 2011 election Major-General Lawrence Onoja to join its fold.
In a petition to the National Chairman of the PDP, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, the stakeholders accused Onoja of allegedly forging the signature of the party’s ward chairman in Idekpa, Ohimini local government area of the state purportedly expressing his intention to rejoin the PDP.
The Benue PDP stakeholders said: “It is regrettable that the person of Onoja fraudulently forged the signature of the ward chairman of Idekpa in a letter he purportedly wrote to your office expressing his intention to rejoin our noble party.”
In the petition signed by 13 of them including a House of Representatives member, Hon. Ezekiel Adaji, his predecessor, Chief Agbo
Ogah, PDP chairman in Ohimini, Chief Nicholas Ochojila, former party chairmen in the state, Chiefs Michael Iduma and Sule Audu as well as Col.Idu Enonche (rtd) among others, said Onoja would be a bad omen if allowed to rejoin the party.
They stated that Onoja’s political history is a manifestation of instability and lack of commitment to party supremacy and discipline which cannot be accepted in the PDP.
“The records have shown that since the year 2003, he has been in and out of the PDP many times.”
He defected from PDP to UNPP in 2003, In the 2007 general elections, he became a member of the ACN. Very recently, in the November 24, 2012 local government elections in Benue State,Onoja led, ACN, to campaign against the PDP in all the 10 wards in Ohimini local government area.
“We are therefore convinced that the attempt by Onoja to return to our fold is not in the progressive interest of our party but a guise to tear us apart.”
They urged the national secretariat of the party to reject Onoja because he would be a political liability to the PDP.