The Anambra State governor Charles Soludo said his party, the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), would earnestly support its presidential candidate Justice Peter Umeadi (rtd) and all Candidates in the 2023 election.
Soludo, in a statement by his Special Adviser on Political Matters, Alex Obiogbolu, said supporting any other party would ruin the chances of the APGA candidates at different levels in 2023.
For him, it was time to support APGA earnestly since the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) did an injustice to the Ndigbo by not zoning its presidential ticket to the Southeast. The governor said the best response to the PDP’s decision would be for Ndigbo (Igbo citizens) to send a “message” by voting for APGA.
He said: “APGA remains the third largest political party in Nigeria, considering the number of political offices it has won. APGA has a state governor, members of the National Assembly, and members of the state assemblies. The vision of APGA for the 2023 general election is to expand its reach and spheres of influence. APGA does not consider the ‘Obidient Movement’ wave as a threat to achieving its goals in 2023,” Soludo confirmed.
He added that “the LP and the ‘Obidient Movement’ are offshoots of the PDP. Therefore, they pose a big threat to PDP, not APGA. We wish Peter Obi good luck, but no matter how much we wish him, everyone knows that we also have our own Peter Umeadi, running for president under APGA. Even if APGA should adopt Obi as its presidential candidate, our votes alone cannot make him president.”
Soludo believes they must send a message that a people rejected will not also reject themselves. “What we want to send as a message is that as APGA people, we want to prove that one who is rejected does not reject himself. We have seen that politically, the Southeast has been denied what ought to be ours by the major parties, especially the PDP founded by Alex Ekwueme.
“PDP’s zoning of presidency to the north is big injustice. PDP was founded on zoning, fairness, and national patriotism. That was why in 2019, the PDP ticket went to a northerner, Atiku Abubakar, and Igbo people supported him; they see PDP as a party that will protect their interests at the national level. Now that it was the turn of the Southeast to be rewarded, PDP threw the slot back to the north. That is a big injustice. In 2023, we need to use APGA to send a message by ensuring that all the people representing us at the National Assembly, both in Anambra and other parts of Southeast, are from the platform of APGA. Anything short of this does not represent the interest and aspiration of our people,” Soludo stated.
S.O