SAN FRANCISCO, August 29, (THEWILL) – The All Progressives Congress, APC, in Enugu State, has threatened to expel the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Geoffrey Onyeama, accusing him of altering the list of delegates that will participate in the forthcoming national convention of the party.
Chairman of the APC in Enugu state, Dr. Ben Nwoye, issued this threat on Tuesday at a press conference in Enugu, where he accused the minister of “sowing seeds of discord”.
Confusion over the list of delegates
from the recent local government congress in Enugu State followed the alleged submission of a ‘harmonised’ list to the national secretariat of the party, after the party’s congress appeal committee had accepted the list submitted by the congress’ organising committee.
Onyeama is alleged to be behind the ‘harmonised’ delegates list, in which the names of some prominent members of the APC in the state, who were not present during the congress, reportedly replaced those of persons who participated in the exercise, whose names were on the original list.
But the News Agency of Nigeria had quoted Onyeama as saying that he was only working towards an amicable resolution of the crisis in the party.
The minister was reported as saying, “I am not involved. In fact, I don’t know some of these people (delegates), so when there were agitations over the list, I got a number of stakeholders and told them that we should harmonise the two lists so that everyone will be included.”
Reacting to the development, Nwoye said the minister lacked the powers to ‘harmonise’ the delegates’ list, claiming that Onyeama had done “more harm than good” to the Enugu APC since he joined the party, following his appointment as minister.
He advised the Foreign Affairs minister to study the party’s constitution, which he said did not give him (Onyeama) the powers he arrogated to himself.
The Enugu APC chairman warned that the minister was on the verge of being expelled from the party, adding that Onyema could face prosecution for the alleged alteration.
“Now that the minister has admitted that he indeed doctored the party’s delegates list, we shall look at it.
“The punishment for such offence is expulsion from the party – if he is indeed the one that said that, he is liable for expulsion and possible prosecution.
“It goes to the heart of our democracy that those who participated in an election will have their names replaced.
“I am shocked that the minister did what he did in breach of Article 21 of our party’s constitution, which prohibits alteration of delegates list,” Nwoye said.
