While the public face of the crisis hangs on alleged mismanagement, financial recklessness and forgery carried out under Abure’s leadership, there is a creeping sense of power play that may reach a climax sooner than expected and keep the factions further apart.Īpart from consolidating its power through constituting a new NEC in Bauchi last Wednesday, the Apapa faction appears to be wary of the stand of Obi’s position on the brewing crisis.įor now, Obi is the bridge linking both groups. With this strength therefore, the Apapa faction appears ready to engage the Abure group in a long- drawn conflict, even after the upcoming Abuja Federal High Court ruling on the locus of each faction. The Abure-led faction still controls a comparatively heavier war chest through the conduct of the governorship primary for off-season polls in the three states of Kogi, Imo and Bayelsa, whose elections are coming up in November 2023.įor as high as N15 million as fees for governorship nomination forms, the faction must have raked in good money from politician who want to burnished their ambition on the altar of a brand new Labour Party whose stock has risen beyond expectation, following the stellar performance of presidential candidate Peter Obi in the Februpresidential poll. What Arabambi could not say, or refused to disclose for obvious reasons, about the source of revenue for his faction, however, is that the faction appears to have fallen on good fortune, which has given them the strength to stand their ground in the lingering crisis rocking the party, courtesy of a Benin High Court ruling that restrained the party’s National Chairman, Julius Abure, from acting. “The same sponsors that supported the party are still sponsoring the party,” he said, adding, ”faction or no faction.”

However, Arabambi stated that if the party chieftains could travel by private jets during electioneering, why should anyone raise eyebrows now that the staff of the party had to fly in a jet to the party’s National Executive Council meeting?

The path of daggers