By Chidiebere Onyemaizu
Following last Saturday’s All Progressives Congress, APC’s coup-like ward congresses in Imo state which saw Governor Rochas Okorocha outsmarted by his former political allies in the party, the governor is now reportedly fighting three –pronged battles for political survival.
Governor Okorocha rejected the outcome of the congress which stripped him bare, rendered him a king without kingdom leaving the APC structure in Imo in the hands of his opponents. Except the governor succeeds in getting President Muhammadu Buhari whom he had rushed to Daura to complain to hours after the congress, and the outgoing National Chairman of the party, John Odigie-Oyegun to order cancellation of the Imo congress results, he may no longer be able to successfully install as governor next year, his anointed successor and son-in-law, Uche Nwosu, at least using the APC platform.
However, irrevocably primed at having Nwosu take over from him, the Imo state governor who is also Chairman of APC Governors Forum, while pulling the strings at the APC National Secretariat and at the presidency to ensure he retrieves back Imo APC, is also shopping for an alternative political platform on which Nwosu could run in the event his loss of APC structure in the state becomes fait accompli. Sources told this Magazine that the governor may fall back on Action Alliance which he funded and supported as a member before his dramatic return to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and subsequent defection to the All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA on which platform he won the Imo guber election in 2011 before berthing in APC in 2013.
It is not however clear whether Okorocha will stay back in the APC while his son –in law flies another party’s flag.An ardent supporter of Nwosu who spoke to The source neither denied nor confirmed the alleged moves by the governor to procure alternative platform for him (Nwosu) if it becomes clear that of APC is no longer within reach. “Nothing is impossible in politics but I can assure of one thing; Uche Nwosu is the next governor of Imo state”, he told the Magazine.
Apart from getting Nwosu to run on an existing political platform other than the APC, it has also been learnt that remnant of APC Imo Exco still loyal to the governor, some of his die-hard loyalists and majority of Nwosu’s supporters want Okorocha to immediately form a new party and adopt his son –in law as the Imo guber candidate of party while himself contest the Imo West (Orlu) senatorial election. According to them, this is to demonstrate to the governor’s opponents that he remains the main issue in Imo politics.
