APC Congress: Okorocha Suffering Rejection from Home, Says Oyegun

By Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja

The National Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, has asked the Imo State Governor, Rochas Okorocha, to look inwards for reasons behind his predicament in the recent nationwide congresses of the party.

He said from what has happened, it appears that there was a “united voice” against the governor.

Oyegun who was responding to the allegation of witch-hunt raised against him by Okorocha as a result of the opposition to his tenure elongation, wondered why the governor is the only one being witch-hunted.

Okorocha had said his national chairman was trying to get back at him as a result of the role he played in ensuring that the Oyegun-led National Working Committee (NWC) did not get the tenure elongation.

However, speaking at an interactive session with journalists during which he  officially withdrew from the national chairmanship race, Oyegun said Okorocha “wasn’t the strongest force behind the objection to tenure elongation.

“So why is his case different? I don’t think it is necessary to go into the details.

“Well the processes are still on and it is not good to answer you in details but the answer lies in one fact that he is not the only one who opposed the so called tenure elongation, how come he is the only one being witch hunted? 

“When you look at the totality of the events in that state, I think you can get a clearer picture of what is going on there. There is a united voice calling for a different way of doing things so to speak.”

Meanwhile, the former Secretary to the APC National Convention Planning Committee, Senator Benjamin Uwajumogu, has said the South-east caucus of the APC is not happy with the style of governance of the Imo State governor.

Uwajimogu who spoke with journalists in Abuja at the weekend, said 95 per cent of the indigenes of Imo State and indeed South-east members of APC are not happy with what is happening in the state under Okorocha.

According to Uwajumogu, who resigned his appointment as Convention Committee Secretary, Imo State has become a basket of “fraud.”

“South-east indigenes are ashamed that the only state that we have that is governed by APC is being run the way we have seen in the last few years. There was no choice but for me to detach myself from that government. I am happy now that I have resigned maybe it would be clear that the convention that is slated to elect national officers, I am aware that the governor is supporting and promoting certain South-east citizens to run for position that they seem to be zoned to South-east. 

“So I am aware that now that I am no longer the secretary of the convention, no one will accuse me of manipulating the result of that convention.”