According to Daily independent, the last Saturday solidarity rally organised by supporters of the party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, was disrupted by supporters of Chijioke Edeoga, who was announced the winner of the repeated primary election.
The Labour Party in Enugu State is in crisis as some aggrieved members of the party have reportedly protested over the choice of the governorship candidate of the party ahead of the 2023 general elections.
According to Daily independent, the last Saturday solidarity rally organised by supporters of the party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, was disrupted by supporters of Chijioke Edeoga, who was announced the winner of the repeated primary election.
Meanwhile, Chief Everest Nnaji was also announced as the gubernatorial candidate of the party.
The two groups of Labour Party members had earlier had a tussle of who emerged the authentic candidate of the party.
Edeoga’s supporters thereby displayed their displeasure over the announcement chanting that Edeoga was their candidate and they disturbed the rally as it took the intervention of security personnel to restore normalcy.
The rally which was said to have been organised by the Nnaji faction of the party in the state, under the aegis of “Charity begins at home” mantra, was believed by many as a plan to officially announced Nnaji as the flag bearer of the party.
The Edeoga group filled the venue in anticipation that the Edeoga candidacy was being hijacked while Edeoga was absent at the rally.
One of the members of the party expressed disappointment over the incident describing it as a plan to discredit Peter Obi’s popularity in the state.
He said “It’s unfortunate that the Labour Party we are dying for is not far different from PDP and APC we are condemning.
“I wonder why Labour Party or whoever sponsoring this crisis will want to impose candidate on us like PDP and APC after we carefully elected Edeoga as the gubernatorial candidate but we must fight and reject this imposition.”
Meanwhile, the two Labour Party candidates, Edeoga and Nnaji struggling to become the flag bearer contested the primary election under the PDP before defecting to the Labour Party.