By Cajetan Mmuta
Members of the Association of Past PDP Councilors and Chairmen in Anambra State, (APPCCAS), on Monday, challenged the National Working Committee (NWC) of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), to sanction a former BoT member of the party, Chief Chris Uba, and his brother, Senator Uguchukwu Uba, for allegedly immersing the party into crisis ahead of the Anambra governorship election.

The group in a communiqué dated Saturday, July 17, 2021, signed by 21 coordinators from the 21 Local Government Areas of the state, after an emergency meeting of the group in Abagana, Njikoka Local Government Area of the state, said that PDP in Anambra State would hardly get it right, if the Uba brothers remained in the party.

The communiqué reads in part, “We’re constrained to issue this communiqué based on our concern that our great party, PDP, had continued to have one issue or the other, which had continued to affect its fortune in successive governorship elections in Anambra.”

“Since year, 2006, when Dr. Chris Ngige of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, lost out in the court to Mr. Peter Obi, who was under the All Progressive Grand Alliance, APGA, PDP had never had the opportunity to have a shot at the Anambra Government House again.”

“Sadly, the ousting of the PDP government under Ngige was as a result of witness from the so-called godfather of Anambra PDP, who told the court that the election was actually rigged in favor of the governor. Since then, in every election, the Uba brothers would cause one problem or the other, which would ultimately rob the party of victory. Some of such issues were that of parallel executive, parallel congresses, and parallel primaries, and so on. These repeated in 2010, 2013, and 2017.”

“In the 2019 general election, our great party lost the Anambra South Senatorial election because Mr. Uba imposed himself on the party as the candidate for the senatorial election,” they stated.

According to the group “Since the year 1999, PDP in Anambra never had duly elected state executive. The successive executive was always hand-picked. This fact is based on available records! It was only the Ndubisi Nwobu led executive; which was recently ousted by the Uba brothers through the court that was democratically elected.”

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“After that, they went ahead to organize parallel governorship primary on June 26, 2021, all in the effort to ensure that PDP is not together in pursuing the victory at the polls. The result of this recent action of the Uba brothers is that the name of the authentic candidate of the party is not published by INEC on July 16, alongside those of other political parties.”

“Therefore, we, as stakeholders of PDP in Anambra, are of the view that the Uba bothers cannot stop manipulating the fortunes of the Anambra PDP unless they are given the level of sanction they deserve; and we urge the National Working Committee of our great party not to handle this request with laxity.”