Crisis brews in Labour Party over released presidential campaign council list

• We’re not regional party, says Publicity Secretary

Crisis is brewing in the Labour Party (LP) as a group within the party has rejected the 1, 234 names released to spearhead the Peter Obi and Yusuf Baba-Ahmed Presidential Campaign Council for the 2023 general election.

A former Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Dr Doyin Okupe was named Director-General of the campaign council while a retired Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG), Mohammed Zarewa was named as the council’s chairman.

Clement Ojukwu and Yunusa Tanko were named the secretary and Chief Spokesperson of the council respectively.

The campaign council also has different directorates headed by a director.

During the event, the chairman of the party, Julius Abure, was represented by the Secretary of the party, Umar Farouk.

But the National Publicity Secretary of the Labour Party, Comrade Arambabi Abayomi, in a short message, said, “We are not involved in Dr Okupe’s mischievous political shenanigans. That is not the party’s programme. He can’t be talking about our party, our party all the time. Which party? Is he the leader of the Labour Party now to announce himself as the DG? It’s an anomaly. Who announced the DG of Atiku? Atiku did it. When Tinubu announced his DG, the party did it.”

“Where is Peter Obi? Okupe doesn’t know what he is doing. I want to be quoted. The DG ought to go to the North East or North Central.

“We are not a sectional political party. Our presidential candidate is Pan Nigerian. How can we have a presidential candidate from the South and the Campaign DG coming from the same South.”