By Emmanuel Nicholas
About four years ago, I wrote about the strange marriage of political enemies in Akwa Ibom APC.
I said emphatically that the reproach of Akwa Ibom All Progressive Congress, APC is a breathtaking ovum, because when you see unfriendly witches forming a common coven. Expect the unthinkable.
As they were trying to manage their deep hates for one another, suddenly an angel of light appeared in their midst from the opposite force, having an undue negative antecedent against each of them. It was a situation of confusion?
The confusion rumbles their minds, and leaves them with so many mind-blowing questions. Should we accept him? Should we celebrate him? Who knows his mission? Is it to build us or to destroy us? They all lamented .
Following this confusion, they all kept smiling faces, they began to dance, their lord says Bring It On, So You Think You Can Dance, and You Got Served? Well, the dance troops are back, but this time, it's with members of APC.
Obong Nsima Ekere was never friendly with Umana Okon Umana. The former believed the latter was one of the factors that forcefully removed him as Deputy Governor.
Sen John Akpan Udodehe never had any intimacy with Umana, knowing fully well that the erstwhile Secretary to the State Government was part of the Government who fought him in 2011 and threw him into the prison.
In the midst of the confusion of these three camps, Sen Godswill Akpabio was brought into APC by the National leadership of the Party.
The party became a house of commotion, everyone gambled to who become the State Leader of the Party.
Akpabio was a political enemy to all other camps, he failed to allow Umana to emerge.
Even Obong Nsima Ekere whom he sent parking from his Government, the bitterness was still there.
Suddenly, the National body of APC recognized Akpabio as the Leader of APC in Akwa Ibom State, the likes of Atuekong Idongesit Etiebet from Umana camp stood as man of iron against his emergence.
That internal fighting and hatred, it is said made the party members to sabotage the election of Obong Nsima Ekere.
The 2019 APC governorship candidate in one of his newspapers commentaries revealed that Akpabio, Udodehe and Umana were working to ensure he failed the governorship election.
Sen Udodehe, on the other hand, was maligning the image of Nsima Ekere, calling him unprintable names, like drug addict, among others.
With these, the stage was set for an Armageddon war within the ranks of Akwa Ibom State APC, and it naturally snowballed into both Sen. Akpabio and Obong Nsima Ekere losing their elections in 2019 with the carcass of the party in Akwa Ibom operating through four separate camps.
Many APC members believed Umana Okon Umana collapsed Obong Nsima Ekere friendship with Rotimi Ameachi.
Ameachi who many also believed sabotaged Nsima Ekere's election because he was not happy about the cordial relationship between Nsima Ekere and Sen Godswill Akpabio.
With the appointment of their principal as a federal minister, the Sen Akpabio Camp struggled to take control of the soul of the party, but the likes of Atuekong Don Etiebet vowed to only allow that to happen, while he was still in this divide. Sen John Udoudehe tried hard to merge his camp with Akpabio, but that was a marriage doomed to fail from the onset.
Other political analysts opined it was bitterness of the past political wars, while the rest believed that it was egoism that ruined that forged union.
When Udodehe was fortuitously appointed National Caretaker secretary of the Party, he thought he had arrived.
He tried to use his new-found powers to escape the political oppression of Akpabio.
Akpabio being a tactical politician, gained strength through the back door of Ahmed Tinubo and strangled Udoedehe with a combination of the kitchen knife of Aisha Buhari, the rest is history for Political research.
Udoedehe managed to form a parallel Government in Akwa Ibom APC but out of negligence, he failed to carry out administrative due process of electing party leaders.
He did not purchase any nomination forms for his team, So Akapbio's camp used that lacuna and filed a suit against him and kicked their asses out of the way.
As soon as Sen. Udoedehe saw that there would be no light at the end of the tunnel, he gathered his followers and left the APC for NNPP. Regrettably, the albatross staring him in the face is the refusal of his major stakeholders to join him in the new-found party.
Sen Godswill Akpabio took over the party leadership in the State, Umana Okon Umana, went on loan to Ameachi and Nsima Ekere become a new indigenous citizen of Canada.
Sen Ita Enang had no choice than to seek political reintegration in Akpabio's Camp, but little did he know that Akpabio will not play tennis of leadership back to his court.
He became very friendly with Akpabio, leaving his original Camp, which was Umana Okon Umana caliphate.
Just like great Maradona who seldom passed his ball to a striker, whom he is not sure will be able to score, Sen Akpabio rather dribbled him out and passed the ball to Obong Akan Udofia, whom he knew was popular and wealthy enough to fight the battle ahead.
Sen Ita Solomon Enang went to the court, other camps who were against Akpabio, laid down their differences and joined forces together and fight the common enemy.
Now they have won, how can they win election against a man who has the party structures in his pocket? Is a no no no.
The only thing that will surely put a stoppage spanner on the wheels of Obong Akan Udofia, is the declaration by the Court that he is not a member of APC.
So, Sen Godswill Akpabio will be left with a choice of choosing another person within the party or go to National Leadership of the Party to get Akan Udofia clearance to contest, which the Constitution of APC permits.
In the meantime, the disparity in Akwa Ibom APC has emptied major stakeholders of the Party back to the Umbrella Party, and they are coming to support the ambition of Pastor Umo Eno.
First it was Apostle Sam Akpan who returned with more than five thousand members and pledged support for Pastor Umo Bassey Eno.
Today, he is a very active PDP party man, who is seen at all the party's activities, mobilizing supporters for 2023 elections.
Rt. Hon Nse Ntuen, whose loyalty to Akpabio propelled him to leave the Party in 2018, returned to PDP with hundreds of supporters and decried the calamities that had befallen him while in APC.
Nse and his group also vowed to give their unalloyed support to Pastor Umo Bassey Eno.
In Itu Local Government Area, Hon Idongesit Ituen returned to PDP family, lamenting how he was cowed with empty promises into APC.
The former House of Assembly member returned to the party with over a thousand supporters and pledged to support Pastor Umo Eno.
Rt Hon Ekerete Ekpeyong, who was one of the members of Umana Okon Umana's camp, left APC to support Pastor Umo Eno in his mission to become the Governor of Akwa Ibom State.
Apart from the above-mentioned big names, many members of APC, who were in Akpabio, Udoedehe or Umana camps, had left APC to increased the support base of Peoples Democratic Party.
With the recent court judgements, cancelling all the purported House of Assembly Primaries in the State, coupled with earlier Federal High court judgement voiding the nomination of Obong Akan Udofia as Party flag-beaer, the APC is heading for a free fall
APC members in virtually every nook and cranny of the state are furious with the Akpabio camp and vowed to decamp to PDP.
Investigations to why most of them have refused to join YPP, revealed that they see the Party as being a union without rooted structures across the State and incapable of winning the governorship election.
Some members of APC also refused to join the Young Progressives over what they called, Akpabio and OBA relationship, stating that a support for OBA is a support of Akpabio.
Their anger steamed from the fact that Sen Godswilll is responsible for the collapse of the APC, but the truth remains that it is the collective bitterness of APC stakeholders against the Leadership of Akpabio in APC.
Apart from hatred for Chief Godswill Akpabio CON, many leaders of APC are sworn political enemies and thus cannot coexist under a single roof
Interesting, APC's collapse is PDP's gain. As the APC's fortune dwindles, the PDP's blossoms. With most of their political actors jumping ship, the APC can be said to have truly collapsed in Akwa Ibom State and this translates into victory for PDP and Pastor Umo Bassey Eno, come 2023 gubernatorial election.
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