The Imo State Chapter has released the list of party’s candidates for the Chairmanship, vice Chairmanship and councilorship positions for the forthcoming Local Government elections.
There have been counter rumours surrounding the lists but TheBeat contacted an aspirant who insisted that unless something else happens, the list below is the authenticity list.
There has been claims that Uzodimma was planning to foist his appointed Sole Administrators SOLADs as elected chairmen to ensure he maintains control of the Local Government and their allocations following the autonomy granted them, which erases the powers of the governor over the elected local government officials.
The lists below seems to agree with the argument that Uzodimma handpicked the candidates and no proper primaries was actually conducted.
Already, several aspirants have started expressing their displeasure quietly hinting that there might be a lot of bad blood in the party in time to come, despite the promise by the governor to refund them of the funds used and purchasing their nomination forms.
A lot of the aspirants have invested hundred of millions in campaign and settling party leaders.
TheBeat observed that will most if the list was made of Uzodimma’s SOLADs as Chairmen, while some of those who were not given the ticket were made the Vice chairmen, examples being in Nkwerre, Ihitte Uboma.
A handful were not from the original SOLAD list and may have been brought by some leaders Uzodimma can trust.
This action has also made it clear to party leaders that Uzodimma doesn’t trust them enough to allow them select candidates for him.
If the leaders were to produce the candidates, they would be more loyal to the leaders than Uzodimma who by the autonomy, has no power over them and cannot remove them.
