By Okwuchukwu Eke
Those who have keenly followed Gov Hope Uzodinma s attempt to browbeat his way into unmerited second term, may have noticed that one of the strategies he adopted for achieving that was taking over structures of key opposition parties.
He was particularly interested in taking over the Labour Party ahead of the governorship election, because he saw it as his biggest stumbling block to winning reelection. His fear had strong and credible basis. Forget the fact that he used coercive forces of state and badly compromised Imo REC and her staff at INEC to suppress and manipulate the will of Imo people at Ward, LG and state collation centres in the February election, the governor deep down in him knows that, LP swept the poll at the polling booths. This fact was attested to by Rt Hon Emeka Ihedioha openly at the presidential election collation centre in Abuja.
What transformed Labour party into a giant killer overnight was the coming in of Mr Peter Obi. Gov Uzodinma understood that the incredible popularity and acceptance Mr Obi enjoys among Nigerian voters instead of ebbing, continues to grow more each passing day.. Thus, his conclusion that if he steps feet into the state and campaigns for the party for the November governorship election, that would automatically put paid to his second term bid.
It was that conviction that he would meet his waterloo in the hands of LP, if he didn’t clip its wings before November, that forced Gov Uzodinma to earmark billions for the purpose of neutralizing it. The first step he took towards achieving that malicious plot was to procure some members of the party at the national level led by Lamidi Apapa. Procuring Apapa and his cohorts mainly from South West was very easy for him, as they were already working for the President Tinubu camp against Mr Obi at the national level then. All Gov Uzodinma did was make an irresistible offer which the LP renegades could not resist and quickly they fell for it. He then used Apapa to procure two of his Imo lieutenants, Basil Maduka and Joseph Ukaegbu.
Their first plot which fell flat on its face was to buy of the party structures. When that collapsed they quickly switched to their plan B, which was to hold parallel primaries and thereafter, proceed to court and hide under it to cause confusion in the party.
This explains why after Maduka and Ukaegbu staged parallel primaries, the former still went ahead to drag the latter to court. You get the gist here? Those men held separate primary election but yet one took the other two court. Why? Because they wanted to use that to achieve an ulterior objective. However, court in Bayelsa State declined jurisdiction on the matter and pronto, Ukaegbu started proclaiming himself guber candidate.
I don’t think one should be a lawyer to know that when a court says it lacks jurisdiction to entertain a matter, that doesn’t in any translate to passing judgement on the matter, given that there was no declaration granting or declining reliefs sought. Without jurisdiction a court can’t hear substantive suit and therefore can’t give judgement. Unfortunately, because the trumped up litigation is a smokescreen to mask their sinister agenda of destabilizing LP so that Uzodinma grabs unmerited second term, Ukaegbu had continued to mischievously claim that the court declared him the candidate of the party.
For two months or thereabout they hid under that cover to create and plant confusion in the party and Imo environment generally. However, last week the reality that that dirty gambit was about to expire dawned on them, when the party announced that Mr Obi and other national leaders and stakeholders of the party are coming to town to handover party flag to the authentic candidate Distinguished Senator Athan Achonu.
That announcement jolted Gov Uzodinma out of his senses momentarily. When he regained them it dawned on him clearly that being spirit and inspiration behind LP once Mr Obi performed that sacred function, his proxy war and the sinister motive behind it would all die naturally.
The realization that they has lost the battle deeply pained him and his camp and as a last ditch effort they decided to cast away the veil on their faces and go straight into the ring for the last fight themselves.
This was the reason throughout last week the full weight of his media propaganda and blackmail machinery was deployed against Mr Obi. From his Chief Presss Secretary down to his attack dogs like Ogubundu Nwadike, Ambrose Nwaogwugwu, Collins Ughabia, Frank Nwete, just to mention a few, descended on Mr Obi and his planned coming.
They churned out lies upon lies, spurned blackmail after blackmail and rained propaganda after propaganda on over media platforms. They wanted to use those dirty antics to pressure and dissaude him from coming, but “Okwute” who has both street and critical political wisdom, read their game well and roundly disappointed them.
But, still the outgoing government refused to give up. On the morning of the rally which turned out mother of all rallies as far as the November governorship election is concerned, Chinasa Nwaneri, the hitman of the outgoing government hurriedly organized a fake protest, in a failed final effort to rubbish Mr Obi and the event.
He paid Owerri youths from Umuonyeche Village Youths and a few other street urchins and provided them with LP insignias, hired a van for them and brought them to the Imo State University IMSU Junction, for the fake protest.
Unfortunately, it fell flat on its face like all the other previous efforts at undermining the visit of the undisputed leader of the party, and especially the focused and unstoppable march of the party to Douglas House.
If Gov Uzodinma and his party “Na Akota Sign”, apologies to ex Gov Okezie Ikpeazu, by now they would have seen the hand writing on the wall, that the resounding failure of their proxy and open war against LP and Mr Obi is the end of road for them.
NIGERIA NEWSPOINT
