Barely three weeks to the June 23 national convention of the All Progressives Congress APC, the secretary of the Convention Planning Committee, Sen. Benjamin Uwajumogu has resigned his appointment due to what he said were “domestic” reasons beyond his control.
In his place, the party has appointed the Chairman of the Board of Niger Delta Development Commission NDDC, Sen. Victor Ndoma-Egba.
National Publicity Secretary of APC, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, announced Ndoma-Egba’s appointment on his APC official Twitter handle at the weekend thus: “APC Nigeria @OfficialAPCNg 1d1 day ago More ANNOUNCEMENT: The Secretary of @OfficialAPCNg National Convention Planning Committee, Sen. Ben Uwajumogu has resigned the position for personal reasons. He has been replaced by Sen. Victor Ndoma-Egba. – @BolajiAbdullahi”.
Speaking further later on the development at the weekend, Mallam Abdullahi said the party hierarchy had since accepted the resignation of Sen. Uwajumogu.
He dismissed reports that the former secretary was forced to resign as a way of acquiescing to the demands of his state governor, Rochas Okorocha, who had threatened to dump the ruling party should his request for a new Scribe be turned down.
“It is not a tradeoff. To the best of my knowledge, the reasons he gave were personal and the National Working Committee NWC has appointed somebody else, Sen. Victor Ndoma-Egba. I do not know how that can be a tradeoff because if it is so, I think his replacement should have been another person from Imo but the new appointee is from Cross River”, said Mallam Abdullahi.
There were speculations Friday night that Uwajumogu had tendered his resignation, but confirming the development at a news conference Saturday in Abuja, the senator said when he accepted the appointment, he had believed that the Convention would hold on May 14, saying the new date of June 23 would clash with his long term ambition to attend the graduation of two of his children from universities in England.
“I want to announce to you that yesterday, I tendered my resignation as the Secretary of the APC Convention Planning Committee and the resignation was accepted last night by the national chairman of the party”, he said.
Speaking further, he said; “The reason why I resigned, primarily is that when I was appointed, the date for the national convention, as we were informed, was to be on May 14. Eventually that date was moved to June 2 and there were hopes that the Convention would hold between June 2 and 9. However, the date has now been moved to June 23 and it will conflict with my family activities and responsibilities. For example, two of my children are graduating from the university in England within this month and I have a responsibility to be there and I have some other jobs at Hans too. So, I decided that since I wont have the time for this convention, I should resign so that the position can be given to somebody who has the time. It is a decision that I took by myself. In my letter thank the national chairman and the Convention committee for all the support I received while I was here”, he said.
On whether he was traded off to accommodate the interests of his state governor, Rochas Okorocha with whom he has had a running battle alongside other stakeholders, Uwajumogu said; “For me, my relationship with him is not a personal thing. It is something that all of us in Imo state are opposed to the way government in Imo state is being run. Our opposition to that is something that is based on principle; based on the fact that 95 percent of Imo citizens and indeed south easterners are not happy with what is happening in Imo state. South east citizens are ashamed, that the only state we, APC, have in the region is being run the way it is in the past three years and for me, I did not have a choice than to detach myself from that government. As a matter of fact, I am happy now that I have resigned, maybe it will be clear that the Convention which is slated to elect national officers,….I am aware that the governor is supporting some south east citizens to run for offices zoned to the region and so now that I have resigned, nobody will accuse me of manipulating the process”.
He said the Convention is not threatened by his exit as the committee had concluded virtually all arrangements to hold the exercise despite having received only N13 million so far for its activities.
