1 week ago
18
By John Ogunsemore
A chieftain of Labour Party (LP), Kenneth Okonkwo, has resigned from the party.
Okonkwo confirmed his resignation, which is effective from February 25, 2025, in a statement on Tuesday.
According to the actor-cum-politician, LP is non-existent as a party.
Okonkwo said, “My entrance to politics is for good governance, and I will continue to work for it to ensure that Nigeria becomes a great country of incorruptible men.
“This aim can no longer be realised within Labour Party as presently constituted.
“Since the party is non-existent as presently constituted, I am constrained to resign my membership of the party.
“To all Nigerians of goodwill who supported us when we needed them most, I pledge my continued loyalty to the Nigerian people in all I will decide to do in my political future.”
He added, “This resignation takes effect from the 25th of February, 2025, which marks the second anniversary of the presidential election of 2023, after which I will be at liberty to join other well-meaning and like-minded Nigerians in charting a great future of good governance for this great country blessed by God.”
He stated that the party has been encumbered by unnecessary litigation and has no effective leadership at the national level.
Okonkwo said, “The former National Chairman of the Labour Party, Julius Abure, and his former National Working Committee, having conducted no national convention known to the law, according to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), and the courts have held that the issue of the leadership of a political party is the internal affair of a political party for which the courts do not have the jurisdiction to entertain, there’s no effective leadership of Labour Party at the national level.
“The Senator Nenadi Usman-led Caretaker Committee, which was duly and legally set up by the National Executive Council (NEC) of the Labour Party, after the non-recognition of the Abure-led National Working Committee (NWC) by INEC, and was given six months to conduct Congresses and the convention, was the only viable option towards salvaging the Labour Party.
“Unfortunately, Abure and his colleagues, with the collaboration of outside forces, expectedly, being political jobbers, launched unnecessary legal challenges against this Caretaker Committee that have inhibited it from functioning.
“It’s more than six months after the inauguration of the Committee, and the Committee has not even taken off, leading many to conclude that the objective of these politicians of bread and butter with their outside collaborators is to bog down the serious members of Labour Party with frivolous and unnecessary litigation till the 2027 election is over.
“Isn’t it curious that a national executive of a political party whose elected members are defecting every day to other parties, and who cannot wage legal battles to recover these seats for their party, is waging ferocious legal battles to maintain their destructive, choking hold on the party?
“It’s obvious that Abure is not interested in the survival of the Labour Party as he is interested in the survival of his pocket.
“If he is interested in the emergence of a southern candidate in the Labour Party to challenge Tinubu in the 2027 presidential election, going by the convention of having a northern national chairman of a party and a southern presidential candidate of the same party, whenever going into election, the first thing he would have done is to cede the position of national chairman to the North since the party is interested in fielding a presidential candidate from the South.”
English (US) ·