Dr Davidson Nnamani rejoins APC at Ikem, Enugu State, citing the capacity and competence of President Bola Tinubu.
By Chinenye Eseke
It was a week to forget for Labour Party in Enugu State as it lost six lawmakers to PDP and a former gubernatorial aspirant, Dr Davidson Nnamani, to the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC.
After having its offices picketed by the Nigeria Labour Congress for alleged illegality in the management of the party, Labour organised a controversial national convention where Julius Abure got himself elected national chairman at Nnewi, Anambra State, without the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in attendance.
That conflict and the crisis at the national secretariat were the reasons given by six Labour Party legislators in Enugu State House of Assembly for dumping the third largest political party in Nigeria and joining the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
Consequently, Labour was degraded from the majority to minority party in the Assembly.
Then Good Friday turned a black Friday as Dr Davidson Nnamani, a former gubernatorial aspirant during 2023 election decamped and returned to APC, his former party, at Ikem, Isiuzo Local Government Area, Enugu State.
Nnamani said that President Bola Tinubu is capable of resolving the multiple problems such as insecurity, economic and other sociopolitical problems, presently confronting the country.
He said the APC has positioned itself to take over Enugu State with the influx of grassroots politicians and statesmen that have declared interest in joining the APC in the state, and some who left the party but have now come back to rejig the party.
He said that they decided to support President Tinubu with their wealth of public and private sector experiences because he means well for the country. He is rejuvenating the third tier of government with the bill he recently presented to the National Assembly for local government autonomy.
Nnamani rejoined APC during a colourful reception at Ikem ward 1 in Isi-Uzo local government area of Enugu state, where he returned to the APC and re registered as a member of the ruling party.
Among those who received him were: APC Ikem ward 1 chairman, Mr. Chinedu Obule; Isi-Uzo Local Government party chairman, Hon. Paul Olinya and his executive; former Enugu East Senatorial candidate of the APC, Chief Tony Mbah and numerous other members of the APC in Isi-Uzo Local Government Area.
Nnamani further explained: “We want to join Chief Bola Ahmed Tinubu to build a progressive Nigeria; we are in a Nigeria where insecurity, food shortage and a lot of other problems are confronting the country. He inherited problems that are enormous but he has the capacity to solve these problems and we as the people in the grassroots, have to give him all the necessary support.
“One thing I noticed about APC in Enugu State is that most of the programmes of the Party that come to the state are directed to other political parties and that makes the party not to grow but we’re going to make a change. For instance, between 2011 and 2019, we had somebody in the Federal Character Commission, Dr. Martin Okeh, he employed 2000 people from Enugu State, but I doubt if anybody from ISI-Uzo Local Government benefited from that programme. Today, we have somebody again in that Commission, we should encourage the person, work with the person to help us employ people because there are ministries and departments that employ graduates and there are programmes in the federal government that we are supposed to benefit from. We will try as much as possible to make these things happen.
“One of the good things about the APC is that it controls the federal government and if you remember the 1983 election, Alex Ekwueme was the vice president while Shehu Shagari was the President and it was necessary to make the then old Anambra State an NPN state. NPN fought so hard and worked so hard and made the party an NPN state so that if they throw something from Abuja, it will come to this place. So what I’m saying is that we are not in a wrong place, APC will by God’s grace take over Enugu State. We will take over Enugu State and we will work towards the progress and development of the country.
“Another aspect of the Tinubu administration is local government autonomy, you know that the local government is autonomous and development will come to the grassroots and it will bring progress .
So we’ll plead with the President, as long as he has presented a bill to the National Assembly, the state assemblies and the governors of the 36 states of the federation will make this happen.
“So, I say thank you for accepting me back, nothing would have happened if I said I want to come back and you said no, you don’t want to accept me. Therefore having accepted me back, I say thank you and I will work to the best of my knowledge to develop the party from the grassroots and for us to be the best. I can assure you that Jagaban is not somebody to toy with. He has the capacity to be president and he has the capacity to sustain the presidency and anybody who wants to dare him has a man to match.”
