Confusion pervades the All Progressives Congress (APC) chapter in Bayelsa State over the preparation by two factions to conduct parallel congresses billed for Saturday to elect party executives into 105 wards.
A Bayelsa State High Court, presided over by Justice Enekinimi Uzaka, has stopped the party from conducting the congresses pending the determination of a subsisting motion on notice.
The court adjourned the matter to 9th August for hearing of the motion before it.
However, before the court gave the order, both factions led Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva, and that of former Minister of state for Agriculture and Rural Development, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, were busy at the two parallel secretariats at Mbiama-Yenagoa Road and Sani Abacha Expressway respectively preparing for the ward congresses.
TrackNews Online visit to the APC secretariat at Mbiama-Yenagoa road revealed that the preparation forms had been dispatched to each ward to be filled by candidates and submitted to the secretariat.
But the Acting Secretary of APC, Alabo Martins told journalists that the party was ready and prepared for the conduct of ward congresses.
He further stated that the party’s stakeholders in the state met to adopt the consensus option of affirmation to elect the required 105 ward executives in the state.
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“It is a peaceful and well organised process in our party,” he said.
Also commenting, factional Acting State Organising Secretary of the party, Tari Emberru, dismissed the claim of purported confusion in the party ahead of Saturday’s congresses, saying, “Our congress from ward, state and national level is a family affair.”