The leadership of the Labour Party yesterday ignored Mr. Peter Obi’s alleged mediation in the public spat between the party and its strongest ally in the run-up to the election, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC).
Obi was the LP presidential candidate in last year’s general election, and rumours have it that he may have lost his grip on the party.
The LP fired a petition against NLC and its President Joe Ajaero to the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Labour and Employment Minister and Registrar of the Trade Union “over the vandalisation of party offices and false claim of party ownership” by the congress.
The party called for disciplinary action against Ajaero and other leaders of the congress.
But congress in a swift response claimed Julius Abure has ceased to be the LP national chairman.
It was gathered in Abuja yesterday that Obi had met with representatives of both sides with a view to reconciling them but all that appeared to have hit the rocks yesterday when the LP leadership denounced Ajaero and other leaders of the NLC for the Wednesday picketing of the party’s offices across the country.
The NLC is laying claim to the ownership of the party and wants the national EXCO led by Julius Abure to resign the national convention of the party convened.
A source close to the gladiators said: “Peter Obi met with some leaders of the party and that of the NLC, and he is mediating to ensure that peace returns to the party.
“He also met with other stakeholders, not just the party leadership and NLC. It is not a media stuff that’s why you didn’t see it in the papers. It is an internal party matter.”
National Chairman of the LP, Julis Abure, and the National Secretary, Umar Ibrahim, accused Ajaero of overreaching himself by using workers’ funds to picket and sponsor insurrection in the Labour Party headquarters; an action they said amounts to abuse of office and should therefore be called to order and properly sanctioned.
