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I can expose Ojukwu –– Okorie
IHEANACHO NWOSU, KENNETH OFOMA,
in Enugu
National
chairman of All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Chekwas Okorie on
Tuesday evening threatened to expose the party’s presidential candidate in the
2003 poll, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, claiming that he knows a lot
about his activities to do so.
With the crisis in the party further
deepening by the ratification of Okorie’s expulsion, by the Sir Victor Umeh
faction same Tuesday, Okorie, in his reaction, dared Ojukwu to do his worst.
Ojukwu convened the APGA stakeholders
meeting in Enugu on Tuesday, and attended by the Umeh faction, where Okorie’s
expulsion was endorsed.
Speaking to newsmen at his Independence
Layout, Enugu, residence hours after the development, Okorie, who alleged that
his life was in danger now, said despite his travails he would "fight on without
fighting him (Ojukwu."
"Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu can do
his worst. I am determined to fight on without fighting him. I will never fight
him; even with what I’m doing, I have not joined issues, because I know enough
in 22 years I have been close with him, and if I want to squeal, I will have a
lot to say. But I won’t go that far, because there is need for me to still prove
that I am capable of keeping confidences, he said.
The APGA leader further explained that
when Ojukwu made his request on January 3, 2005 for him (Chekwas) to produce the
party’s cheques to prove that he did not sign the cheques alone as alleged by
Sir Umeh, he promptly applied to the bank for the cheques.
"But on January 21, 2005 he (Ojukwu) had
already written his letter to Chief Victor Umeh led faction supporting them and
donating N500,000 to enable them facilitate my removal," he said.
Chief Okorie alleged that it was the
National Treasurer of the party and the factional national chairman, Chief Umeh
that instigated Ojukwu against him, but that instead of maintaining neutrality
like a father over his fighting children, Dim Ojukwu took sides with Umeh.
Dwelling on his expulsion, he said Ojukwu
was not competent to convene any such stakeholders’ meeting and that the matter
is subjudice because two suits involving him and the Chief Victor Umeh-led
faction are pending in courts in Abuja.
Okorie said that Chief Umeh went to court
first with the hope of securing an injunction restraining him from operating as
the national chairman of APGA and that he filed a counter-application in defence.
According to him, Umeh’s suit number is
276 while his own is suit 178.
"This suit is coming up on February 21 for
mention. And it was while this suit was pending that Dim Chukwuemeka
Odumegwu-Ojukwu chose to call a meeting he is not competent to convene, to
accuse me, to prosecute me and to judge me all in my absence," he said.
"Let me state that I am not bothered one
bit. I am not bothered because INEC is on my side. I am not bothered because
public opinion is on my side, including public sympathy. I am not bothered
because the constitution of APGA is on my side. I am also not bothered because
in the law court I am several steps ahead of them. The question is, after
today’s (Tuesday) meeting, what next?"
He insisted that his life was in danger.
Said he: "The reason of calling you here
this evening is to tell you to inform the Nigerian public, if you may, that I,
Chief Chekwas Okorie, national chairman of APGA, wish to state that should
anything happen to me or my life, that Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu
should be held one hundred per cent responsible.
"Even if I said I won’t join issues, I
will be failing if I don’t alert Nigerians and Ndigbo of this threat to
my life and in fact some gentlemen have been commissioned to carry out this
dirty job. I will never go into hiding, I will continue to do that which God has
commissioned me to do," Okorie alleged.
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