Ebonyi State Governor, Dave Umahi, has disclosed that all the Presidential aspirants of the All progressives Congress (APC), stayed away from the meeting called by the party’s candidate’s Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu campaign team for lack of respect from the convener.
Umahi said that the convener, a former presidential aspirant, Dr Nicolas Felix, does not have the capacity to call for such a critical meeting ahead of the 2023 election, considering the status of those that were expected to attend including the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, and Chairman of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum (NGF) and Ekiti State Governor, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, among others.
The governor stressed that aside from the convener’s status, Felix also invited everyone that contested the presidential primary including him, the Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, through Short Messages (SMS), describing such action as disrespectful to individuals that have held important positions across the country.
Umahi, while fielding questions on a popular television programme via Zoom from Abakaliki, the Ebonyi State capital on Friday, said despite a series of pre-event publicity, the meeting failed the critical test of integrity.
Due to Umahi and others’ absence, which sources said was due to their non-committal, the meeting was postponed indefinitely by the convener without any reason.
Expressing his displeasure over the method the meeting was convened, Umahi emphasized that there were procedures for any engagement and that the proper steps must be adhered to.
According to him, “We were waiting for the meeting to take place after the APC flagbearer had visited other aspirants individually, but we were surprised that someone that did not poll enough votes during the exercise was convening a meeting.
“And the aspirant did not visit each of the aspirants to ask that they attend the meeting, rather he sent us SMS and we all, including the Vice President considered that to be disrespectful.
“Asiwaju (Tinubu) has emerged as the party’s candidate and we expected that he should convene such a meeting where all the aspirants would attend and everyone would discuss together what strategy could be deployed for the election.
“But rather than see all these, what we were made to discover was a meeting called by a proxy and to us, that is a private meeting and not the one that we were expected to attend”, he added.
The convener, Felix, in a statement earlier in the week, said those who contested against the APC presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu at the presidential primary, would converge on Abuja at 2 pm on Wednesday, August 31st, 2022.
He said, “We will also brainstorm on adopting winning campaign strategies to support our standard-bearer, Bola Tinubu, and seek to carry every Nigerian along in our bid to coast home to victory in the 2023 general elections.”
But before the meeting was scheduled to start, Felix announced its postponement, stating that a new date would be announced. He, however, did not give the reason for the cancellation of the roundtable.
Felix’s statement read, “Please be informed that the strategic meeting of 2023 Presidential Aspirants of the All Progressives Congress, scheduled to hold on Wednesday the 31st of August has been postponed. A new date for the meeting will be communicated soon. Apologies for any inconvenience(s) that this might cause.”
Among those expected were former Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi; former Science and Technology Minister, Ogbonnaya Onu; former Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba and former Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Godswill Akpabio.
Others were Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello, Jigawa governor, Abubakar Badaru, Ben Ayade of Cross River, Ogun State ex-governor and serving senator, Ibikunle Amosun; a serving senator, Ajayi Boroffice; former Zamfara governor, Ahmad Sani; former Imo State governor and serving senator, Rochas Okorocha; a former Senate President, Ken Nnamani, a former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole; fiery cleric, Tunde Bakare; Pastor and Businessman, Dr Nicolas Felix; former Information Minister, Ikeobasi Mokelu; Businessman, Tein Jack-Rich and the only female among them, Uju Ken-Ohanenye.