Posted by By CHIDI OBINECHE on
Chairman of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), Chief Edwin Ume-Ezeoke has given an insight into why he dumped his principal, General Muhammadu Buhari (retd) with whom he ran the 2007 presidential polls as the party's vice presidential candidate.
Chairman of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), Chief Edwin Ume-Ezeoke has given an insight into why he dumped his principal, General Muhammadu Buhari (retd) with whom he ran the 2007 presidential polls as the party's vice presidential candidate.
According to Ume-Ezeoke, Buhari had no chance of overturning President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua's victory at the court, but he would not listen to the party's advice not to engage in a legal battle.
Already, the presidential polls tribunal had dismissed Buhari's petitions against Yar'Adua and Ume-Ezeoke in an exclusive interview with Daily Sun in his Abuja home expressed pessimism at the chances of the ANPP standard bearer winning his appeal at the Supreme Court.
According to him, Buhari's challenge of Yar'Adua's victory was a sheer waste of time as he had long been advised to back down on the legal tussle, owing to perceptible deficiencies in his legal representation.
Said he, 'We advised our presidential candidate accordingly, that the party is certain that this case will not yield any fruit at all, and will not be of any benefit to the party, particularly knowing the character and conduct of his counsel. I knew from his records that we would never win any petition. We told our presidential candidate so.
'We have been justified so far. He lost in 2003. This one again, he lost. He has gone to the Supreme Court. I have no hope that he will win at the Supreme Court."
Ume-Ezeoke, however, refuted claims that the party was divided owing to divergent views on the petition.
Despite the disagreement with the ANPP presidential standard bearer, Ume-Ezeoke maintained that the party was united.
'Buhari is still a member of our party and all his supporters are all members of the party," he stressed.
He described the crises in the Sokoto and Kebbi States chapters of the party as a non-issue, saying the defectors 'simply joined the PDP, because they said, there, the pasture is greener."
The ANPP national chairman urged Nigerians to remain steadfast in their support of democracy and the ANPP 'as the only party that will give them those things that they require to live a good life in this country.
'Only ANPP has the human resources to make life better for them. We are now facing global food crises. I have not seen any agenda in the present government to tackle the global crises. It will soon reach Nigeria," Ume Ezeoke added.
He said the on-going probes of the past regime was one of the conditions they gave President Yar'Adua before joining his government.