The Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Benjamin Kalu, on Sunday secretly appeared before the APC Screening Committee for the House of Representatives primaries in Bende Federal Constituency shifting his focus from the Abia State governorship race.
The development comes after months of bold claims by the Deputy Speaker that he would challenge and unseat Governor Alex Otti in the 2027 governorship election.
His decision to return to the House of Representatives contest has continued to generate reactions within political circles in Abia State and among supporters of the APC.
The once thunderous voice that filled the airwaves with ambitious governorship calculations has suddenly gone silent. The man whose supporters loudly marketed as the supposed political messiah to “rescue” Abia in 2027 has quietly disappeared from the battlefield he once pretended to dominate.
According to confirmed reports, the Deputy Speaker was screened alongside other aspirants by Panel C at Treasures Suites & Conferences, Abuja, not for governorship, but for the very same Federal House seat many believed he had outgrown politically.
The secrecy surrounding the screening has only deepened suspicions within APC circles themselves. Many party faithful who once defended the Deputy Speaker’s “larger ambition” now feel abandoned, confused, and politically stranded.
Some are asking privately whether the governorship aspiration was ever real or merely a bargaining chip for political negotiations ahead of 2027.
Others believe the handwriting became clear after internal assessments reportedly revealed the enormous difficulty of marketing the APC brand in Abia against the growing popularity of Governor Alex Otti’s governance style and infrastructural drive.
