*Our Exco Is Intact, Says Uroupa, As Two Excos Emerge
THERE appears to be no end in sight in the crises rocking the Labour Party (LP) at the national level and the Edo State chapter, as the Julius Abure-led leadership, on Monday, May 27, sacked the Kelly Ogbaloi-led state executive and in its set up a 17-man caretaker committee, headed by a former speaker of the state House of Assembly, Elizabeth Ativie, to run its affairs.
The crisis in the state escalated on May 25, when the leaders in the Arue-Uromi Ward 3 in the Esan North-East Local Council suspended Abure for alleged high-handedness and anti-party activities.
A letter of suspension, dated May 14, and another letter of ratification, dated May 15, both of which were ratified at a meeting of the state executive committee on Friday, May 24, in Benin, said Abure’s suspension was with immediate effect, urging him to restrain from holding out or parading himself as a member of the party in the Ward 3.
But the national leadership denied knowledge of the suspension, insisting that Abure remained a member and indeed the party’s national chairman.
On Monday, some members of the party from the state stormed the national secretariat in buses to deliver the letter from the state chapter ratifying Abure’s suspension, but were attacked by persons suspected to the national chairman’s supporters.
In a swift reaction to the move by the Edo State chapter, the national leadership sacked the state executive and inaugurated, in its place, a caretaker committee at a ceremony supervised by the Deputy National Chairman, Dr. Ayo Olorunfemi, who stated that the action was necessitated by the fact that the tenure of the Ogbaloi-led executive elapsed in April this year.
He said the caretaker committee was expected to take charge of the affairs, pending when a fresh congress would hold to elect a new executive in the state, noting that the party decided to appoint Ativie as the state chairman due to her result-oriented track record in her political positions so far.
Olorunfemi called for unity in the party, assuring that the party would be united in the state with the new caretaker committee.
Responding, Ativie promised to move the party to a higher level in the state and reconcile all aggrieved members
The action of the national leadership may have led to the existence of two parallel executives in the state, as the Publicity Secretary of the chapter, Mr. Samson Uroupa, insisted that “the exco of the party in Edo State remains intact.”
He stated that the development was not in the interest of the majority of members of the party in the state and the dissolution of the state executive would not stand, as it was capable of creating more crisis in the party, which he said would not help the LP in the forthcoming governorship election.
