By PAMELA EBOH, Awka

Frontline rights group, International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety), has predicted the defection of Anambra State Governor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, and Enugu State Governor-elect, Mr. Peter Mbah, to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

Intersociety has, therefore, called for the impeachment of any elected governor in the South East that makes move to defect to another political party other than the political platform he was elected.

The group In a statement on Thursday signed by Board Chairman Emeka Umeagbalasi, and Head, Democracy and Good Governance Programme, Chinwe Umeche, Esq, among others, described Imo State as the next in line in the journey to liberate the zone from political office and leadership shackles and manacles.

In revealing that fresh political defections were thickening in South-East states of Enugu and Anambra, the group said:

“Intersociety has carefully followed the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) over its decision to suspend the collation of Governorship results in Enugu (Nkanu East and Nsukka) and Abia (Obingwa) for ‘review’ and later obtained a credible intelligence informing us of what transpired in Abuja, including alleged compromises and promises made to the powers that be by the Enugu Political Dynasty (called “Ebeano Dynasty”); one of which was reported imminent collapsing (after swearing in) of the state gubernatorial seat and political structures into APC.

“Credence was lent to the above by recent disharmonious relationship between the Enugu Political Dynasty and the leader of Ebeano Dynasty throwing his political weight behind APC and its presidential candidate, Ahmed Bola Tinubu.

“Intersociety further gathered that ‘award’ of governorship victory to Enugu PDP Candidate by INEC was part of the deal and that the same would have been repeated in Abia State if not for the tightness of the matter and uncompromising stance of Collation Officer, Prof Nnenna Oti.

“Critics have also found it difficult in recent times to differentiate between INEC and APC, especially as it concerns the Commission’s independence, neutrality and integrity.”

On Anambra State, Intersociety said that the body language of Governor Chukwuma Soludo has raised a serious suspicion of imminence of defection of the state’s gubernatorial seat and political structures to APC.

It noted that apart from not hiding his recent strong opposition to collective political aspiration of the South-East Region unconnected with “it is not my turn” or “2025 Ozigbo factor,” Soludo’s hasty, unpopular, non-consultative and unilateral congratulatory message to Ahmed Bola Tinubu, “the INEC-declared ‘President-Elect’ and the wording of his congratulatory message has further raised a strong suspicion in that direction.

The group added: “There is also a second option being rumored which is: to retain PDP or APGA structures as offshoots of APC and its anti-South-East People and their development policies.

“Governors of Enugu, Anambra and Abia must be publicly barred from defection or risk impeachment.

“The act of collapsing the state structures into a popularly rejected political party and its ruling class is totally condemned and must be resisted in the South-East.

“It must be pointed out that no elected Governor has a right and power to defect and collapse the state structures into a regionally unpopular party.

“It has also been investigated and found that the rampancy in elected Governors’ maddening defections and collapsing of their State structures into a regionally unpopular political party and its ruling class are crudely driven by selfish political interests, including self anointment as ‘Igbo political leaders’.

“This is even when their ‘output legitimacies’ (achievements) are nothing to write home about. Emeka Umeagbalasi, Board Chair of Intersociety, sees the Governors’ self-centeredness and selfish interests as “nothing short of a colonial era Isuofia man in present Aguata, Anambra State who applied for a police job and was invited for an interview in Enugu.

“To honor the interview, he boarded a public transport and abruptly alighted at Oji River and started arresting his fellow commuters even when he was not yet a conscripted police officer. One of his town’s men spotted and angrily said to him: Nwanna (my brother), you are not yet a Police officer but have started making arrests, what then will become of your Umunna (kindred) if eventually you become a police officer?”

While calling on all democratic forces in the South-East to resist the dangerous trend and mobilize forces towards the impeachment of any governor that henceforth defects in the region, the group urged any Governor tired of governing the state through the political platform he was elected to resign and vacate his gubernatorial seat

It further described the Collation Officer of Abia State, Prof. Nnenna Oti, as a heroine and next INEC Chairman In 2025.

“Intersociety not only heartily congratulates and celebrates the courageous and conscientious Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Prof Mrs. Nnenna Oti, who stood her ground and insisted that the sacred electoral wishes of the people of Abia State in the just held governorship election in the state must not be toyed with; but we have also put her name down as a matter of conscientious recommendation as the next Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission.

“Although the conscientious motherly professor was one of those installed by the APC cabal preparatory for rigging of the 2023 Presidential Poll from 2020 and 2021 when she became VC, FUTO, but she has distinguished herself as one of the minutest few that survived the ‘APC virus in Nigeria’.

“Consumed victims of the ‘APC virus in Nigeria’ include Amnesty International in Nigeria, the National Human Rights Commission, the Lagos School of Rights and Democracy Activism and its formerly respected leaders as well as dozens, if not hundreds, of respected university professors and other university dons.

“We hereby strongly recommend the erudite and highly revered Prof. Mrs. Oti for INEC Chairmanship by July 2025 when the current integrity-challenged Chair will end his last term in office having been first appointed in July 2015.

“There is also the possibility of invocation of ‘doctrine of necessity’ to get him to step aside much sooner before then if ‘the come comes to the come and become;’ replacing him with Prof Mrs. Nnenna Oti,” Intersociety added.

Update news