Addressing newsmen in Calabar ahead of the APC governorship primaries, Chairman of the group, Effiong Sebastien said that to ensure that the party unites ahead of the general elections, APC needs to field a neutral person who doesn’t belong to any faction as its governorship candidate.
The group insisted, “Those contesting governorship from the central were not smart enough because if they were, they would have sponsored someone from the north for the chairmanship position of the party.
“Even if the person had not won, they would have had good case now to argue that other zones didn’t observe zoning in the election. Similarly, the people in the south, having failed to do that, the governorship ticket remains in the north.
“Besides, it’s politically wrong for APC to field a governorship candidate from the zone that has the chairman. We’re here today to send a message to the leadership of our party from ward to the national level.
“We have been in opposition for about 20 years now and there have never been a better opportunity for the party to win the State than now.
“The party since in 2015 have been engulfed in crisis engineered by personal interest. During the last national convention, there was a directive from the national secretariat that the subsisting zoning arrangement of the party be maintained.
“This was why the central retained the chairmanship and the South was left to contest the national zonal Vice Chairman (South South).”
The youths continued, “Largely, people believe that the party is sharply divided between the Minister of Niger Delta, Pastor Usani Usani and Sen. John Owan Enoh who are both aspirants from the central.
“The best way to bring the two factions together is to bring Upan Odey who belongs to none. As it is now, Usani group won’t vote Owan and Owan group won’t vote Usani if any of them emerged APC candidate.”
