A member of the Enugu State House of Assembly, Hon Harrison Ogara, Tuesday, told THE WHISTLER that it would be a moral burden for him to leave the Labour Party that provided him the platform to become a lawmaker and join the Peoples Democratic Party.
Recall that six members of the Assembly elected on the platform of LP two weeks ago joined the PDP, making the hitherto minority PDP to become the majority. Those that decamped cited crisis in the Labour Party as the cause. Ogara, who is also the Chairman, Committee on Information and Communications in the Assembly, said such moves were because Nigerian politics lacks ideologies.
He said, “I did not join in the decamping because it would be a moral burden upon me. I was in the PDP, and contested the election under the party. But midway into the contest, I was told I was not good enough for the position. I left the party and found a place in the Labour Party and won. Morally, it will be a burden for me to jettison the party that provided me the platform, and join the same party that rejected me to even contest because the primary was so skewed to favour a particular candidate. If I will move away, let it be known that, maybe, LP is no longer working to gain power in the next election. There is no crisis in the LP, and even if there is, no party in Nigeria does not have crisis. You must wait to see to the end before you make a move.”
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On whether LP lawmakers that decamped should be categorised as betrayers, Ogara said, “If you call it betrayal, you are not far from the truth. If you call it the Nigerian way of politicking, you are not far from the truth. An average politician in Nigeria has no ideology. That is the reason why somebody can move from one party to another arbitrarily. Wherever he finds a favourable space, he goes there. This is unlike what we have in saner climes such as the US. There is nothing that can make a Conservative to change to another side, or a Republican to decamp to Democrats. In Nigeria, anything goes. What played out in Enugu House of Assembly is a combination of many factors.”
On the future of LP in Enugu State, Ogara said, “It is not as if the leadership of the party in the state is in a crisis. Barr Casmir Agbo is still our chairman. Nobody is contesting it with him. In fact the structure of the party down to the ward levels is still intact. The media urns try to create a scene where people will read their posts. Those that moved to PDP from LP cited crisis. It is not. There was a case in the court, and the Supreme Court pronounced Julius Abure as the legitimate national chairman. By the time they were going over to the PDP, that matter had been resolved at the Supreme Court. Which crisis are you referring to?”
He urged LP supporters to remain calm, adding that he was already impacting his constituents with the resources at his disposal. Quoting him, “We are less than one year in office. Decamping should not distract our attention. We should be talking about making the common man in Enugu State the beneficiary of our government.”