Two top-ranking officials of the People's Democratic Party have given Saharareporters details of how the Anambra State chapter of the party was sold to Chris Uba and Clement Ibeto by party members acting on behalf of Umaru Yar'adua and his wife, Turai.
The sources said Chris Uba doled out N1.6 billion to members of the PDP's National Working Committee (NWC) to perfect the deal to hand him the state chapter. In addition, a source close to cement mogul, Clement Ibeto, said the Nnewi-born businessman paid N1 billion to Yar’adua’s closest pal and cross-border smuggler, Dahiru Mangal, with clear specification that more than half of the amount is to be handed to Yar’adua and his wife, Hajia Turai Yar'adua. The talkative Chris Uba has also boasted to associates that he also gave a token fee of N50 million to Nigeria’s gluttonous Attorney General , Michael Aondoakaa, who then wrote a legal opinion that cleared the way for Uba and Ibeto assume control of the state party structure. In order to smoothen the deal, the duo gave N250 million to Abba Ruma, Yar'adua's Minister of Agriculture, to secure his help in persuading Yar’adua to sign off on the deal.
Our sources said the financial deal to sell the Anambra PDP to Chris Uba and Ibeto was likely to turn the state into a deeper state of mayhem and anarchy beginning next year. Chris Uba was at the center of the political crisis that embroiled the state after the 2003 elections after he exploited his closeness to former President Olusegun Obasanjo to unleash mayhem, including the abduction of former Governor Chris Ngige, whom he had imposed, and the marshalling of thugs who terrorized the state for three days, engaging in widespread destruction of public property. “It’s amazing that the party, with the consent of the president, would ask a notorious political gangster to once again be the face of the party in Anambra,” said a top PDP source.
Our highly reliable sources said Chris Uba, a younger brother to Emmanuel Nnamdi Uba (popularly known as Andy), former President Olusegun Obasanjo's domestic aide, has subsequently anointed his candidates for the February 6, 2010 governorship election. Chris, who never finished his secondary school education, has picked Dr. Harry Oranezi as his candidate for Anambra governor while Uchenna Emordi has been tapped to be deputy governor. Oranezi, a former member of the House of Representatives, is described as Chris Uba’s former "thug-in-chief." For his part, Emordi ran the state’s chapter of the PDP under Uba’s tutelage.
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A knowledgeable source told Saharareporters that, in the event that Oranezi is rejected for any reason, Chris Uba has lined up a spare candidate in the person of Damian Okoli. Okoli is Chris Uba's in-law.
A member of the ruling party in Abuja told Saharareporters that, with Uba’s choice of the duo of Oranezi and Emordi (and with Okoli on standby), the fate of the former governor of the central bank of Nigeria, Charles Soludo, is effectively sealed. Supported by corrupt maestro Tony Anenih and the unprincipled former Vice President Alex Ekwueme, Soludo had made a splashy entry a few weeks ago into the contest for governorship. Some political analysts have argued that Soludo’s gubernatorial ambition is fueled by a desperate desire to buy himself immunity for the monumental financial shenanigans perpetrated by him and several fired bank CEOs currently under indictment.
Meanwhile, a PDP source told Saharareporters that Chris Uba and the PDP hierarchy have decided to shut out Andy Uba from the gubernatorial contest on the platform of the PDP. Ibeto has not forgiven Andy for helping Aliko Dangote in a move to squeeze Ibeto out of the cement market. The junior Uba is also at loggerheads with his brother, Andy, who in 2007 hijacked the Anambra PDP from Chris and effectively sidelined his brash younger brother. Chris has told his associates that Andy used his closeness to Obasanjo to muscle his way into political prominence in Anambra, but states now that his brother is “finished politically.” One of Chris Uba’s closest associates said “Only Chris could have made Andy governor, but Andy thought that Obasanjo and Professor Iwu would be able to do it.”
Meanwhile, Andy Uba is currently engaged in a bizarre legal maneuver aimed at wresting power from current Governor Peter Obi without going through an election.
A source close to Andy Uba said the former domestic aide “has virtually been throwing a party to celebrate a ruling” given by the Supreme Court earlier this week. The source said Uba has interpreted the apex court’s refusal to grant an order sought by Nicholas Ukachukwu to compel the electoral commission to conduct a governorship election in Anambra as an implicit recognition of his claim to be a so-called governor-in-waiting. But an Abuja-based senior advocate of Nigeria, who is familiar with the intricacies of the Supreme Court’s ruling, said Andy Uba “would be delusional if he thinks the court’s ruling translates into a tacit endorsement of his hare-brained rigmarole to become a governor without standing in an election.”
Our sources revealed that Chris Uba and Ibeto are planning to cash in big after actualizing their plans to smuggle their anointed candidates into office. Several sources told us that the two PDP “owners” have made all the local government delegates to swear to blood oaths of “full loyalty.” Uba and Ibeto have also compelled their gubernatorial candidates to swear to blood oath to pay their sponsors N4 billion every month from the state coffers.
Chris Uba rose to notoriety in 2003 when he resorted to hiring thugs to destroy public infrastructure after he fell out with Chris Ngige, his anointed candidate in the 2003 governorship elections. As soon as Dr. Ngige reneged on an arrangement to hand the resources of Anambra State to Uba, the enfant terrible conspired with Obasanjo and former Inspector General of Police, Tafa Balogun, to abduct the former governor. But the plot to dethrone Ngige proved more difficult than Uba and Obasanjo expected. It was only in March of 2005 that a Court of Appeal removed Ngige from office, replacing him with Peter Obi of APGA, the rightful winner of the 2003 gubernatorial election.
Obi and Ngige are also positioning to run in next year’s election, but one of our sources within the PDP said Maurice Iwu has already promised that, regardless of how the votes turn out, he would declare the candidate of the PDP as the winner.
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