APGA candidate sacked by court for Soludo joins APC

A former candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance for the November 6 Anambra Governorship Election, Chukwuma Umeoji, has defected to the All Progressives Congress, a week to the poll.

Umeoji, who is the current member of the House of Representatives representing Aguata Federal Constituency in Anambra State, was recently sacked by a Court decision after his name had been listed by the Independent National Electoral Commission as APGA’s candidate.

The court then ordered INEC to replace Umeoji with Professor Charles Soludo, a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, as the validly elected candidate of APGA for next Saturday’s governorship election.

Umeoji defected to the APC along with two House of Assembly members and thousands of party supporters.

This is contained in a statement on Saturday by the factional APGA National Publicity Secretary, Ikechukwu Chukwunyere, made available to our correspondent, in Abuja.

It was titled, ‘Umeoji, two state lawmakers dumps APGA for APC, declares Support for Andy Uba.’

The Caretaker Committee Chairman of the APC, Governor Mai Mala Buni, the statement added, had received Umeoji with excitement.

It explained that Buni described Umeoji as the game-changer for the election and declared that with the development, APC would win the election.

Part of the statement read, “With this development, APGA has lost its simple majority in the House of Assembly and has become a minority party in the state while APC has become the majority party in the State House of Assembly.