Ruth Oginyi
The All Progressives Congress APC Ebonyi State chapter has denied the rumor that the party collected an extra four hundred thousand naira only from aspirants for the 2023 state house of Assembly.
Reports have it that about twenty-five aspirants for the election were asked to pay 400,000 before the screening.
A source close to the party alleged that the 25 aspirants were made to pay N900, 000 against the normal N 500, 000 paid for state clearance during the alleged screening at the party’s Secretariat in Abakakili over the weekend.
But the state APC Chairman, Stanley Okoro Emegha in a statement on Monday debunked the allegation and described it as a shame, phony, and feigned.
Emegha explained that the party was yet to commission a screening committee at their National Secretariat in Abuja.
The statement read in parts, “Why do some people take pleasure in hitting up the polity for no just reason. I also learned that the aspirants who purchased their expression of interest and nomination forms at Abuja are claiming that they have petitioned the National leadership and other stakeholders of the party to intervene over the most foolish allegation. This shows how desperate and confused people can be over nothing. Lawyers will always say “you cannot place something on nothing and expect it to stand”. Let them continue to display their desperation and torment”.
“APC Ebonyi State is one and no individual or group can destroy the party nor its victory. From the onset of this administration, I alongside other members of my executive promised to give everyone a voice and this has remained our principle and driving force’.
“It also beats my imagination that few individuals will just meet to tarnish someone’s hard-earned reputation over nothing. How can they also be laying claims that I made myself incommunicado by not responding to calls or text messages? This is a fallacy because everyone can attest that as the state Party Chairman, I respond to call at a dial”.
“To my greatest astonishment, the said
aspirants were alleging also that they were asked to pay a whopping sum of N900,000, for the state clearances instead of N500, 000. The question should be, how and who requested it since they were shot out of the alleged screening exercise. However, we did not mandate any aspirant to pay an extra N400, 000″
“You can see I’m happy because the spokesman of the group is a lawyer and am sure he knows the legal implications of his action”.
“As an advocate of peace at any front, I’m still extending the olive branch to whosoever that is nursing ill feelings of any kind against the party to come forth for negotiation because our party’s victory at the general elections cannot be jeopardized or truncated due to reconcilable difference among members of one indivisible entity.
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