The dinner on Thursday night at the residence of the National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Dr. Bamanga Tukur was meant to serve as melting point for all the aggrieved parties in the festering crisis in Anambra State chapter of the party.
The idea was for the aspirants to come together and amicably resolve the problem. At the instance of the Chairman, the 13 aspirants cleared to contest the party’s primary for the November 16 Governorship elections were invited to a dinner.
Except Dr. Andy Ubah, others were present. However, sources told Saturday Pilot yesterday that rather than achieve the purpose, the dinner became a forum for the aspirants to open what could be termed can of worms and to reveal the underbelly of the marred party primary held last weekend in Awka which produced two winners from two factions-Dr. Andy Ubah from the Ejike Oguebego faction and Mr. Tony Nwoye from another faction led by Mr. Emeakanyi. Other dignitaries at the meeting were Prince Chibudom Nwuche, Acting Deputy National Chairman, Senator Margery Okadigbo, His Excellency Dr. Chinweoke Mbadinuju, former governor and Prof. ABC Nwosu.
However, efforts by Dr. Tukur to make the aspirants accept the candidature of Mr. Tony Nwoye as the party’s flag bearer were rebuffed by other aspirants. They were said to have queried the National Chairman for rushing Nwoye’s name to INEC when all contending issues over his purported election had not been resolved.
They were said to have cited the various cases in courts including the injunction obtained by Mr. Nicholas Ukachukwu from the Federal High Court Port Harcourt barring the Chairman and members of the National Working Committee from recognizing Nwoye as party’s candidate for the Anambra Election. In the opinion of the aspirants (many of whom are lawyers) the first step to peaceful resolution of the matter was either withdrawal or vacating of the cases. Their position was said to have angered the National Chairman who left the dinner for another assignment in the State House.
But before he left, Mr. Mike Okoye one of the aspirants was said to have accused Dr. Tukur of complicity in the crisis rocking the party in Anambra State. He was said to have accused the chairman of favouring three of the aspirants. One of them is said to be Tony Nwoye who is alleged to be sponsored by Chief Arthur Eze, a very close friend of Tukur. Okoye also faulted the Tax clearance certificate submitted by Nwoye to the PDP as well as punctured Nwoye’s claim to being a medical doctor. He was said to have stated that while Nwoye claims to be a medical doctor, investigations conducted showed that he did not finish his medical studies in the University as evidenced in the nomination form he filled and submitted to the PDP (Copy obtained by Saturday Pilot). Nwoye was also accused of falsifying the tax clearance certificate he submitted to the party. This is one of the grounds upon which Mr. Nicholas Ukachukwu went to court to obtain injunction. In response, Nwoye was said to have refused to respond to the allegation of forging tax papers, but said he met the basic educational requirements to be a state governor, which is secondary school.
In the PDP nomination form, Nwoye said he attended Community High School Nsugbe from 1987 to 1991 and Metropolitan Secondary School Onitsha from 1991 to 1992 respectively.
On the issue of tax papers, the PDP Screening Committee had on 6th August disqualified Nwoye on two grounds. One, irregular tax clearance certificate and two, tax clearance not backed with tax receipts. But he appealed the decision and was cleared by the Appeal panel to participate in the primary.
The screening committee’s observations included irregularities in the dates, sources of income, title and total taxable income. Nwoye presented three different tax certificates from three states- FCT (Garki), Anambra ( Awka) and Enugu for the period 2008 to 2012. For instance, in 2010, he claimed in the Garki Abuja certificate that his total income was N313, 750, but in the one from Awka he stated N7, 286, 9318 and in the Enugu certificate for same year it was N238, 750. And whereas the Enugu certificate has date of tax receipts as 16/07/08 for 2008, 19/09/09 for 2009 and 12/05/10 for 2010 payments, those of Awka were paid same day 7/6/12 and Abuja same day of 19/07/13. In the same vein, whereas Nwoye in the Abuja tax certificate gave his source of income as ‘business’, he wrote ‘medical practice’ for the Awka certificate and nothing for Enugu.
Observers say he couldn’t have claimed ‘medical practice’ as source of income since he is not a medical doctor. “at least he did not say so in his nomination form filled and signed by him. How then can he claim what he knows is not true?” said a PDP chieftain from the state.
Efforts made to speak to Tony Nwoye last night proved abortive as his phone line was unreachable, but one of his close aides said the allegations of forging tax clearance certificates were false, stating that the former Student Union Leader and former PDP Anambra State Chairman is a good and honest man attributing the allegations to the handiwork of Nwoye’s political opponents.
However, following the inability of the meeting to arrive at an agreement, some of the aspirants met again yesterday at the Sheraton Hotel Abuja. At the meeting two options were agreed. One is for the national executive of the party to cancel the results of the two primaries and conduct fresh primary under a neutral electoral committee and whoever wins would become the party flag bearer.
In the alternative, they want President Goodluck Jonathan to pick a consensus candidate from among the aspirants. Such aspirant they said should be somebody with grassroots support who would win the election so as not to allow opposition parties especially the newly registered All Progressives Congress, APC, to take over the control of the state government. They also urged President Jonathan to direct all aspirants with cases in court to immediately withdraw them to pave way for peaceful settlement. The President is expected to meet all the aspirants in the State House on Monday.