A former Governor of Imo State, Senator Rochas Okorocha, has declared that his political party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), was no more.
Okorocha, senator representing Imo West senatorial district, stated this while reacting to the party’s defeat in the just concluded Edo Governorship election.
Igbere TV had on Sunday reported how Governor Godwin Obaseki, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, secured 307,955 votes to defeat Osagie Ize-Iyamu, the APC candidate, who got 223, 619 votes.
Addressing newsmen on Sunday, in Abuja, Okorocha said that only respect for President Muhammadu Buhari is all that is left of the APC.
The former Imo governor also declared that the crisis rocking the party was part of consequences for relegating the founding members.
According to him, the party that is smarting from internal crisis after the 2019 general elections, died the day the leadership abandoned the progressive and democratic ideals on which it was founded.
Okorocha, who is a founding member of the APC, said that apart from President Buhari, the other leaders of the political blocks that merged to form the party in 2015, were practically schemed out by forces that later joined the party.
“Permit me to give you the inside of APC, this word APC was formed by four major political parties that had governors, one was the CPC led by President Muhammadu Buhari, ACN led by Ahmed Tinubu, ANPP led by Ogbonnaya Onu who all brought their structure, APGA led by me brought in our structure. Every other person fell into this structure. The PDP group came in and joined us. I gave the name APC. I designed that logo and that was the beginning of the party and we had understanding.
“That is the party you call APC and unless we go back to where it all started, APC can never see the light of the day and that was how we started and that was what brought President Muhammadu Buhari to office.
“You cannot rule out the role of these four key people, then CPC has only one governor in Nasarawa, APGA had only one governor, ACN came with the chunk of the governors and ANPP had a few. And we shared the first positions equally among these four parties. Now the founding fathers of the part are relegated to the backgrounds and people are coming with different interests making us play the same kind of politics that PDP played,” Okorocha said.
He added, “There is no more APC, what we have is the respect for President Muhammadu Buhari, that is what is keeping us together. What we have is our respect for the person of President Buhari and we still believe that something can be done.
“That trust and respect is what we still call APC, outside that, respect for President Buhari and the trust and belief that he could wake up one day and correct all these injustices and make it fine. That is the only thing that is keeping the APC, if not that, I don’t think there is anything like APC because people are beginning to get fed up. Again, PDP is not even better, the party has its own challenges.”
