By Emmanuel Ugwu
Former governorship candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) in Abia State, Mr. Alex Otti, yesterday formally declared for the All Progressives Congress (APC), saying that he was still committed to the struggle to liberate Abia from bad governance.
Otti was received into his new party at his Nvosi Ward 5 in Isiala Ngwa South local government with party leaders and members in the ward and local government enthusiastically welcoming him into APC.
He was first received by the ward chairman. Francis Nnamdi, who took him to the leader of the party in the w ard, Chief Victor Amata, who then presented “the big fish” they caught to the local government chairman of the party, Ezinwa Nwuzo.
In his speech entitled ‘Always for the good of the people’ Otti explained that he joined APC to further seek ways to give a new lease of life to the people of Abia which the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had failed to do since 1999.
But he acknowledged that quitting APGA after being its flag bearer in 2015 and 2019 was a very tough decision which took long in coming but nonetheless came at the right time.
“My decision to leave APGA was not an easy one and it was not taken overnight,” he said, adding that “it was a decision based on my unshakable belief that it was for the good of the people and my great state of Abia.”
Alluding to his governorship ambition which he was yet to realise, the former bank boss said that he hadn’t given up chasing his dream because “if you embark on a journey, you’ll keep on walking until you get to your destination.”
According to him, when he left his top position in the banking sector to join politics, he was “never under any illusion that the journey would be long, rough and treacherous” hence he vowed that liberating Abia from bad governance remains a task that must be done.
“We sincerely believe in a dream – the dream of improving the circumstances of our people. That dream will not die,” he assured.
Otti lamented that Abia had remained in the choking stranglehold of “a monster called PDP” which was making it difficult for the state to breathe.
He said that the vicious grip of bad governance had only yielded negative development indices for Abia as the state had continued to move in circular motion under the control of incompetent leaders without vision.
Otti made a clarion call for all well-meaning Abians to rise up and join in the struggle to liberate God’s own state from bad governance and “end government of looters by looters”.
After the welcome ceremony at the local level Otti was escorted in a convoy to the state capital, Umuahia where he was presented to the state executives of Abia APC headed by Hon Donatus Nwankpa.
