The Rivers chapter of All Progressives Congress has without mincing words announced that it considered the formal exit of one of its chieftains, Senator Magnus Abe and his associates from its ranks as a good riddance for the State chapter of the party.
The party had stated this at a Press Conference which had been addressed by Chris Finebone, its Rivers State Publicity Secretary in reaction to the formal resignation of Magnus Abe and some of the other members of his faction from the group.
Read Also: I’ve Left APC But Still Support Bola Tinubu – Magnus Abe
According to him, the exit of Abe can be likened to successful excision of a debilitating cancer from the body.
“Rivers APC can now heave a sigh of relief from the sustained destabilizing onslaught by Senator Abe. We wish him well as he joins the SDP. We pray that he takes everything he exhibited in APC particularly his nuisance value to his new party so that the world would see him for who he truly is.
Finebone said without an iota of doubt, Senator Abe and his supporters had, by their actions and utterances, long ceased to be functional members of APC.
“They shunned and refused to participate in the Membership Re-validation exercise that was carried out nationwide by the Party. They also abstained from other legitimate activities of the Party, making their recent purported resignation a mere formality and part of their face-saving exit strategy aimed at deceiving the public.
He acknowledged that recently, a few members of our Party in Rivers State resigned their membership of the Party, but he noted that those who resigned for two .
“The first is made up of a few persons who either resigned to pursue other interests in life or exercised their right of free association by seeking greener political pastures elsewhere. To these persons, we acknowledge the contributions of some of them to the Party and wish them well in their future endeavours.
“A few persons that are loyal to Senator Magnus Abe have also resigned recently. These are individuals who have, for the past couple of years, spoken and acted in every way to destroy the APC in Rivers State. Led by Abe, these persons tried all they could to factionalize our Party in the State.
The party said Abe group had connived endlessly with the governor of Rivers State and used some elements in the State Judiciary to frustrate and destroy the needless agitations. And culmination of their evil machinations was the exclusion of Rivers APC from the ballot in 2019.
“Evidence exists how Senator Abe and his lieutenants broke into celebration the day the Party was excluded by the court from participating in that election due to their litigation.
Tracing the what the party considers the antics of Abe and his group pointed out that after the 2019 unfortunate development, Abe continued to receive support from outside the State and persisted in undermining Rivers APC through every imaginable means principally through frivolous litigation executed through his proxies.
“At a time, they attacked and completely destroyed the then Rivers APC Secretariat at Forces Avenue, Old GRA, Port Harcourt. Recently, they also hired hoodlums and attempted to destroy the present Secretariat of the Party.
“Tired of Abe’s antics, majority of his supporters openly joined the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the State while others found their way back to the mainstream of the Party. However, it recently came to our attention that Senator Abe and the few persons still with him had concluded plans to join the Social Democratic Party (SDP) on whose platform Abe will run for governor, hence their persistent hype to the effect that Abe will be on the ballot come 2023.”
Senator Magnus Ngei Abe had indicated that he has left the APC in Rivers State but he had however announced that he is still part of the family of the APC Presidential Candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Abe, who stated this while speaking on TVC Television Programme on Wednesday morning in Abuja, maintained that he left in order to seek fortune somewhere else.
However, the former Senator insisted that although he has left the party, the purported letter of resignation circulating online does not originate from him.
He said: “I have since left the APC in Rivers State but the letter circulating round is not from me. I am still part of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s family and has no issue with him whatsoever.
“I am a part of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s political family and I’m also part of his own family, and that is a very separate thing, from the politics of Rivers State.
“Yesterday, there were some funny letters circulating on the internet, that I have resign from the APC because Asiwaju refused to intervene in the politics of Rivers State, that is ridiculous, all politics is local, I have no interest whatsoever in the APC in Rivers State.
“When people talk about resignation, how do I resign from the party I don’t even know who the ward chairman is, so I couldn’t have written a letter to people that I don’t know, what I know from the Constitution of the APC, and the constitution of the country is that there are several means by which you leave the party, and one of the means is by way of resignation. So resignation is just one of the ways that are available to members to leave the party.
“You can leave by resignation, you can leave by death, you can withdraw your membership, you can join another political party, the way the APC is sinking in Rivers State it makes no sense for any politician that has serious political interest in the State to remain in the All Progressives Congress in Rivers State.
“I have no stake in the APC in Rivers State, I don’t know anybody that is in the entire executive of the APC in all the 319 wards in the State. I don’t even know who my ward chairman is neither do I know any ward ex-officio, officer of the party. I don’t have anybody who is running for any office in the APC in Rivers State that I know, except Asiwaju who is running for President.”
