No less than 20 State chairmen of the Labour Party, on Friday, forced their way into the National Secretariat of the party insisting the party is the property of Nigeria and cannot be hijacked by any other interest or persons other than the public interest represented by Julius Abure, whom the party has elected to steer the affairs of the Labour Party.
State chairman of Kwara and the Spokesman of the Council of Labour Party Chairman across the states and the FCT, High Chief Rotimi Kehinde, said this, after leading supporters of Abure into the secretariat.
His words: “Some hours ago we were amazed at the report that hoodlums and thugs invaded our party secretariat at Utako, that is why we came.
“We were told that they went to court and took a particular order but they did not wait for the court to determine whatever motion of notice is, they took laws into their hands to come and destroy our Secretariat
“That is why, as a very important organ of National Executive Council (NEC), the council of chairmen in the party which constitute NEC along with the members of our party, decided to come here to do an on-the-spot assessment and on getting here we discovered that these sets of hoodlums, some of them have been suspended and are no more members of our party.
“Some of them sold our party to other political parties. The party is still investigating to see that they have violated our rights as a political party and they have gone all around to intimidate us with security agencies.
“We are saying that we can not be intimidated, we can not be cowed. Labour Party has come to stay in Nigeria, we want to advise all political parties to allow us, leave us alone.
“We want to tell all the security agencies not to turn to political party members because the police are not party members so they should do what is right according to the rule of law.
“You can not be a judge in your case. They want to be judges in their case by taking the law into their own hands and that is why we are here with our entire members from all over the country to denounce this obnoxious and evil move aimed to derail us from pursuing the mandate that Nigerians have given to us.
“Nigerians gave us their mandate on the 25th of February 2023 and on that mandate we stand. That is why we believe in the rule of law and that is why we have gone to the tribunal.
“Instead of creating diversion and division in our party, we will not agree. That is why we are telling the whole world we have begun the legal process on this evil and barbaric act.
Another State chairman of the Labour Party from Enugu State, Barr. Cashmir Uchenna Agbo said the whole episode was unfortunate especially as the faction that has taken the party to Court was enforcing the order of the court without regard for the constitution of the party that placed the responsibility of the penalty on the National Chairman of the party on the convention.
His words: “What is happening here is very unfortunate because the Labour Party is a part of rule of law and our principal has maintained that we must be guided by the Constitutional provisions and the laws of this land and the party.
“It is very unfortunate that those who have run this party for many years are doing acts of Brigandage and criminality in terms of enforcing their own rights.
“The position of the party and the mechanism in the resolution of crises is very clear, in the constitution, you have to exhaust that mechanism in court. You go to court and obtain Court order and you want to enforce that order by yourself.
“What am saying in effect is that they mixed criminality with civil process and the court that gave them that order erred in law because there are a plethora of such cases that once you have element of criminality in any motion, you just put the other party in notice so that he could be heard.
“You cannot shave a man’s head in his absence. You have done this to this party, we are referring to a party in particular in this country that is known for criminality and brigandage. And that is APC
“APC should leave this country alone, we won this election free and fair.
“We are challenging the outcome by INEC in court. They should allow the Court Process to finish, what they are doing is to enforce their will and distracts Labour Party nationwide and withdraw the case in court.
“Labour Party will say no and on this note, we are saying that Julius Abure is the authentic Chairman of Labour Party in Nigeria. And there is nobody except NEC that can remove Abure, the Enugu State Chairman stated.
The Edo State Chairman of the Labour Party, Ogbaloi Kelly who spoke to journalists at the Nationals Secretariat said, the NWC is a subordinate organ to the NEC of the party, therefore, when a faction of it is coming here to take laws into its hands it becomes a total nullity.
“When those who are taking this action are members of the party who have since been suspended by the party, and as at the time they took this action, the suspension had not been lifted and therefore, we are saying here that the 36 chairmen around the states have come to take their possession.
“These miscreants led by Apapa to this place are not people who have authority to control this matter but this detachment here has the authority in law to be in charge of the party and we affirm that Comrade Barr Julius Abure, is the part chairman and it remains so.
“NLc as of today has confirmed that I’m their communications and so we have come here to tell the people of the world that the action of this faction is a total nullity and should be disregarded because the action does not follow the content of the rules and constitution of the Labour Party.
“We have 28 chairmen here now. Anambra, Edo, Ekiti, Sokoto, Kaduna, Kano, Kogi, Ebonyi, Delta, Kwara, Benue, Ondo, Nasarawa” amongst others.
On his part, after arriving at the scene, The DPO Utako Police Station, Gregory Victor said the police took over the secretariat to prevent the breakdown of law and order.
He blamed the party chairmen for coming to take over their property in a commando style, adding that, if uniformed and uniformed security men were not on ground lawlessness would have been the order of the day.
He said the police had to secure the place to prevent such scenario and pointed out that without police presence the property would have been able to take over by varied interests causing breakdown of law and order.
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