FORMER Governor Peter Obi’s recent defection from All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA, to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, is still causing ripples, with Governor Willie Obiano’s senior special assistant on inter party affairs, Chief Ben Obi saying yesterday that the late Ikemba Nnewi, Chief Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu knew that the former governor would dump APGA.
Addressing reporters in Awka, Ben Obi, who also served as SSA to former Governor Obi said that it was in his presence that the late Ikemba Nnewi asked Obi three times if he would leave APGA to which the former governor vowed that such a thing would never happen.
PETER OBI: I have no ambition to go to senate
He said: “I saw his defection coming because I worked with him as SSA on inter party affairs and throughout the period he was in court fighting to get his mandate back.
“We grew up together and attended the same school and I knew that Obi is very crafty, which sometimes fail him.
“During his tenure, we were at the Holy Trinity Cathedral, Onitsha when Ojukwu fainted. I had to carry him in my Hummer Jeep to the nearby Waterside Hospital for treatment and as I was singing a song to him, Obi came in. At that point, Ikemba raised his head and asked Obi if he was sure he would not leave APGA and he answered yes. Ojukwu repeated the question two times and this made Obi to swear with a bible he was holding that he would never leave APGA to any other party.
“Ojukwu asked this the question because he suspected that the former governor would dump APGA as soon as he (Ojukwu) was no more. It was unfortunate that he he did not keep to that promise.”
He (Obi) once said that leaving APGA to PDP was like going to Iraq, adding that by eventually joining PDP, he is in Iraq and he knew the consequences.
He also said that it was unfortunate that the former governor castigated Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State for leaving APGA when he too was planning to do the same thing as soon as he left office.
Obi also said that it was because of the former governor that APGA lost all the senatorial seats in 2011, particularly that of Anambra Central contested by the late Professor Dora Akunyili.
He said further: “He did not want Akunyili to be in the senate because of his own ambition of going to the senate in 2015. If he wanted Akunyili to go to senate, why did he take her to the Head Bridge Drug market, Onitsha to campaign knowing the role Akunyili played in fighting fake drug producers in that market as the director general of NAFDAC?
“Besides, Head Bridge is not even part of Anambra Central and he took her there just to mess her up and he got what he wanted because we were stoned by the traders who were still bearing grudges against Akunyili.”