On Tuesday, Ebonyi State Governor David Umahi explained why he left the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to join the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) (APC).
WITHIN NIGERIA recalls that Umahi formally defected from the PDP to the APC on November 17, 2020. The Governor claimed at the time that he switched to the ruling party due to the PDP’s treatment of the Southeast.
Umahi stated two years ago that he had made no agreement with the APC or any party member regarding the zoning of the presidential position to the southeast in 2023, as some have claimed.
Speaking in Port Harcourt, Rivers State’s capital, on Tuesday after meeting with Governor Nyesom Wike, Umahi said he predicted the PDP’s future two years ago.
WITHIN NIGERIA reports that Umahi was in Port Harcourt on purpose for Governor Wike’s project commissioning ceremony on Tuesday, November 22, 2022.
Speaking on why he left the PDP, Umahi stated in Port Harcourt that he anticipated betrayal in the opposition camp, adding that he also predicted that there would be no equity and justice in the party at this time.
The Ebonyi State Governor made the remarks in response to the crisis rocking the PDP camp, which involved Governor Wike and four of his allies seeking the removal of the party’s national chairman, Iyorchia Ayu, ahead of the 2023 general elections.
Addressing Wike, Umahi said:
You know your excellency. You may not know that I am also an Apostle and a Deacon.
When I pulled out of PDP, I didn’t pull out of PDP because of you. We’ve been together, we always plan together, and we put Secondus together.
You always conceive the idea, and they will always sell it to us. But I foresaw today, I foresaw there would be betrayal, I foresaw there wouldn’t be equity and justice. And that was why I pulled out.
But for the sake of the unity of this country. We must put the unity of this country first. We must have Nigeria before anyone can be president, governor, can be this and that.
And I want to thank you very much. But on what you are doing in the River States, what you are doing across the nation is giving a lot of proof that you don’t care who Yoruba, who is Igbo or who is South-South or who is Hausa.
Everybody to you is one and is about the soul of Nigeria. I commend you very very highly.