Akwa Ibom governor says he’s not joining APC, sponsors of rumour exposed

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has dismissed as false a report in the local media that Governor Udom Emmanuel was planning to defect from the party to the All Progressives Congress (APC) ahead of the 2023 general elections.

Mr Emmanuel, who is doing his second term as governor, has also denied the report.

“Akwa Ibom is not like any other state, we are people of integrity and cannot be swayed or distracted from our responsibilities by false speculations,” the governor said on Tuesday in Oron where he was inaugurating roads constructed by his administration.

“Akwa Ibom is PDP and PDP is Akwa Ibom and all the development (projects) in Akwa Ibom are by the PDP government.”

In a statement issued on Tuesday, the spokesperson of the PDP in Akwa Ibom, Borono Bassey, said Mr Emmanuel remained a committed leader of the PDP in Akwa Ibom.

“The intendment of this pernicious rumour which unfortunately has arrived at the most inappropriate of moments is targeted at misleading Akwa Ibom people and perhaps causing an unnecessary agitation in our polity.

“As a party, we wish to affirm that Mr Emmanuel, a leader with a towering record of integrity and performance, remains a very committed and dutiful leader of the Peoples Democratic Party in Akwa Ibom State,” Mr Bassey said in the statement.

He urged people in Akwa Ibom to disregard the “rumour.”

“As a party, we reiterate that no performing PDP Governor would leave our Party to join a party that has visited untold hardship on Nigerians.

“Akwa Ibom State, under the leadership of Gov. Udom Emmanuel is marching forward with the PDP and no form of hallucinations from men of the Broom-wielding coven can change this resolve,” the PDP spokesperson said.

The rumour that Mr Emmanuel was planning to move to the APC has been fueled by the recent defection of Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River State from the PDP to the APC.

SPONSORS OF RUMOUR EXPOSED

The Udom-led administration has clearly broken the jink of urban reconstruction in Akwa Ibom and in this case, in Oron where he has reconstructed the road networks in terms of size, shape and quality. Oron now wears a new look with assurances of better days ahead.

At the commissioning ceremony of one of the roads today, the people poured out in the numbers in appreciation of a man they described as non-sectionalist, focused and palpably committed to fulfilling his vision for the state and achieving all he promised in his various social contracts with the people.

The Governor took the opportunity of the commissioning and the huge crowd to state that he and all other stakeholders are well aware of the scheme and those behind the spewing and spinning of the contrived rumors about his leaving the PDP. While saying, it is the wish of some sinister-oriented people as well as an impossible dream, he averred that the fallacy is part of the orchestration of those who hope to return to the PDP through the back door and who desire to save face by leveraging on the trumped-up excuse that he was leaving the PDP to cowardly walk back into reckoning.

He added that while the PDP is available and willing to accept returnees and more members, the days of trickery, playing god and lone wolves are gone. To this end, he admonished that rumours won’t help anyone upset the balance the Party currently enjoys. He concluded that the truth is now sacrosanct and religiously in force in the Akwa Ibom PDP of today.