Lucky Obukohwo, Reporting
Oredo All Progressives Congress (APC) Concerned Group, has called for the sack of the party’s secretary over an alleged lopsidedness in party’s positions in Oredo Local Government Area of Edo State, believed to have been engineered by its State Secretary, Lawrence Okah.
Flowing from that, the group has called for his resignation forthwith to save the party in the local government from total anarchy.
The group, made up of card carrying members of the APC in Oredo, said the call became absolutely necessary following the “outright marginalisation of 11 wards and the favouring of only Ward 7 in Oredo Local Government Area where he, Lawrence Okah hails from.”
Addressing Journalists a press conference in Benin on Monday, coordinator of the group, Osamuyi Osadiaye, said the State Secretary has pocketed all political positions allocated to Oredo LG to his Ward 7, thereby making the remaining 11 wards of the local government council redundant.
He said: “Lawrence Okah disproportionately allocated key party and government positions to the people from Ward 7 of Oredo Local Government Area, Edo State, and thus sidelined the other 11 wards. These positions, which are disproportionately concentrated in Ward 7, are inimical to APC ideology as a party.”
Naming the political positions occupied by people from Ward 7 alone, Osadiaye said: “The State Secretary of APC. Local Government Party Chairman of APC. Assistant Treasurer of APC. Publicity Secretary of APC. Member of the state House of Assembly.”
He added: “Member representing Edo South in Oil and Gas, WHO HAPPENS TO BE THE SON OF THE STATE SECRETARY OF APC, MR LAWRENCE OKAH. Three Senior Special Assistants and 2 Special Assistants to the speaker, Edo State House of Assembly. 15 Oredo revenue collectors. Supervisory Councillor, Oredo, and many more.”
Coordinator of the group, while appealing to “APC party leaders across Edo State to call LAWRENCE OKAH to order and give other wards in the LGA an opportunity to feature in the present dispensation, especially in the upcoming Local Government Election in Edo State,” lamented that “this imbalanced political appointment is threatening the unity and progress of APC in the council.”
He also called on “His Excellency, Governor Monday Okpebholo to ensure fair and inclusive appointments across all wards in Oredo.”
In a swift reaction, State Publicity Secretary of the APC, Barrister Uwadiae Igbinigie, described the allegations as “foul cry far from the reality.”