Imo: How residents mocked Okorocha/Buhari’s rally

Last Tuesday, the All Progressives Congress(APC) held its South East Mega Rally in Owerri, Imo state in support of President Muhammadu Buhari’s second term bid, as well as Okorocha’s ambition.
In the streets of Owerri and its environs, residents mocked the governor, calling the rally ‘rented crowd’, ‘show of shame’.
CHIDIEBERE IWUOHA who spoke to a cross section of residents, reports
Before the rally Many political observers were surprised when they heard that an APC rally was to hold in Owerri.
“Owerri of all places?” was the statement on their lips.
It is not that Owerri, the Imo state capital cannot comfortably host any event or rally of any kind.
After all, it harbours some of the best hotels and fine hangouts that visitors would like or cherish.
They asked that question because the said party, APC at the Imo state level has been ridden with crises lately.
It would be recalled that they held their congresses when others held theirs but it appeared that their problem overshadowed those of other states as their own made the existing factions in the party become more pronounced and led to members making comments claiming that their individual groups were in charge.
Doubts, subterfuge The result was that while a group known as Imo APC Coalition claimed they had won all the congresses, another group, propelled by the governor said that there were no congresses and even took over the State Secretariat of the party and appointed a parallel State Exco.
The two factions eventually took the problem to Abuja unresolved for the party’s National Convention.
On that day they engaged themselves in exchange of blows and destroyed electoral materials which today, has gone down in history as “show of shame”.
The result was that about six states, especially the South East states which Imo is one, in the geo political zone and where the problem emanated, did not vote.
It was also alleged that the governor stormed Abuja with paid thugs, in addition to his own delegates, and even bribed some governors and delegates, especially from the northern part of the country for them to vote out Senator Osita Izunaso whom he believed played a major role in his camp losing the state congress and put his man, Hon. Barr. Emma Ibediro.
So when people heard that Imo would be organizing a rally for the president they started asking themselves “Who and who will attend this rally?” “Will Buhari finally come to Imo state?”, “When did the factions resolve their crisis to be able to conduct a rally?” However, a good number of politicians knew that the rally was staged by Okorocha to further pursue his ambition to hold on to power, shut out those from the opposing camp and give the presidency the impression that he was in control.
This was the situation until last Tuesday when the rally was held.
Okorocha’s power ambition It is a general belief in the state that the APC South East Rally for Buhari was held because Okorocha wanted to hold on to power even after his eight year tenure in office.
This is because before this time, he had never hidden his desire to see his son- in-law take over from him in 2019.
He made it clear that he (Hon Uche Nwosu) was the most qualified person in the state and was younger than those coming out.
He dared those who tried to raise objection or indicated interest in the position.
When they discovered that he was serious, especially as there were endorsements from the Imo State House of Assembly, local government areas and different groups under APC.
Some of them left his camp and started singing a different tone which manifested in the APC Coalition.
To further underscore the belief that Okorocha wanted to hold on to power, he inaugurated his own State Party Exco, with his own Acting Chairman, Hon Chris Oguoma as against the leadership of Chief Hilary Ekeh who supposedly won the congress.
But some people, especially those opposed to Governor Okorocha’s camp and the opposition in the state dismissed it with the wave of hand and alleged that the governor and his people went out of their ways to hire crowd and paid them off, just to give the impression that they were in charge.
So, when the rally was to be held, many did not believe it, including the elected National Chairman of the party, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole who attested in Owerri that Tuesday, that he did not believe that it would be held but because the governor stood strongly behind him while he was contesting he decided to come to Owerri.
He further praised him for his developmental strides and assured him that the party would follow his footsteps, as though to pay him back for his support.
To further prove his control over the party in the state, ironically most of the organizers of the rally were found out to be his people, even though it was a South East function.
Little wonder then when it was discovered that the major stakeholders like those who belong to the Imo APC Coalition and the federal ministers of APC extraction did not attend the rally.
Our correspondent also discovered that the attendees of the rally were ‘settled’ by their leaders from the Imo state government purse as pictures to that effect went viral on social media.