The National Chairman of All Progressives Party (APC), Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, will tuesday meet with Chief Great Ovedje Ogboru, Hon. Victor Ochei and other political top-notch in Delta State.
The meeting, scheduled for the APC national secretariat in Abuja, THISDAY learnt, is part of preparations towards the formal reception of Ogboru, the Delta State governorship candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2015 election, Ochei, erstwhile Speaker of the state House of Assembly (DTHA), as well as chieftains of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and their supporters in the state into the fold of the APC.
The state Chairman of the APC, Mr. Jones Ode Erue, would be joined by the state party leader, Olorogun O’tega Emerhor, to officially present Ogboru and Ochei, two politicians considered as prominent sons of the state to the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party in Abuja.
The state APC delegation is expected to paint the nation’s capital red with a colourful ceremony beginning with a motorcade leaving their hotel to the national secretariat of the party.
Ogboru, popularly referred to by his teeming supporters as “The People’s General”, contested the emergence of Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as governor in the 2015 election from the election tribunal to the Supreme Court as the LP candidate level while Ochei flew the flag of Accord Party for the Delta North senatorial seat.
Ochei was Speaker of the state legislature (DTHA) during the tenure of ex-Delta State Governor, Dr Emmanuel Eweta Uduaghan.
A statement released in Asaba by the Chairman of Delta APC Welcoming Committee, Hon. Alfred Okpowhoro Oloko, said the national chairman of the party, Oyegun, and members of the NWC of the APC “will graciously receive the two political tacticians who recently dumped their former parties, LP and the SDP to join the APC in Delta State.”
He further disclosed that his (welcoming) “committee was set up by the State Executive Committee (SEC) of the party to anchor the processes and arrangements to receive new entrants to the party.”
He noted that the efforts of committee paid off with decision of Ogboru, Ochei and “other key new entrants finally agreed to mutually negotiated terms, which the party’s national chairman and NWC will validate tomorrow, June 28, 2016 at the party national secretariat in Abuja.”
However, invited party leaders are expected to meet at the lobby of Transcorp Hilton Hotel, Abuja by 12 noon from where the Delta State delegation will proceed in a convoy to the national secretariat of the APC for the formal presentation and reception.
“A mega welcoming rally will be held in the near future to send a clear signal to the opposition party, the PDP that APC Delta is ready and willing to take over Government House Asaba in 2019,” the committee chairman further said.
The statement added, “In the light of the above, membership registration exercise for new entrants shall commence on June 30, at every ward in Delta State and shall open for a two weeks period.”
