The All Progressives Congress has kick-started the 2019 campaign by setting up a committee to review the performance of the party in the last governorship election in Anambra State.
According to the APC National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, the Committee would also look at how the party can make in role in the South East in 2019.
The four-man committee headed by the former governor of Ekiti State, Otunba Niyi Adebayo was giving 30 days to completes its assignment.
The APC National Chairman in his remarks before the inauguration of the committee emphasized the need to bring the South East and South South into the main fold of APC.
He noted the geopolitical zones importance to the victory of APC in the next year general elections.
He said, “The South East and the South South would be crucial and critical for our victory in 2019.
Not from the point of view of numbers of votes because we are fairly confident, having gone through our initial planning that the APC would carry the day in 2019 but for us it is critical that the S/E and S/S both these geographical zones have contributed immensely to the survival of this nation, therefore must fully be represented in what is going to be a truly national government of the APC in 2019.
So, learning from the experience, in this particular case of the South East – the result of the Anambra election – in which l must personally confess that l was disappointed in terms of votes that we got at that election.
I expected a much better result than that. It has become necessary therefore drawing from that at this early stage to examine why the votes that the APC scored were much lower than we expected.
“So, today we are inaugurating a strategic committee and the mandate is for you, Chief Niyi Adebayo and your team to do a forensic examination of what could have gone wrong; why did we not do well as we expected; what were the factors that contributed to our low score.
“We did much better compare to the 2015, no question about that but in all fairness, given the work we put in and given the reactions of the public and the rest of it there was no question at all that we ought to have done a lot better.
“So, the question today is why. It is important that we are using Anambra as a trigger.
“The terms of reference were drafted and appropriately worded to give you the scope to look at the possibilities – God forbid- a repetition of what happened in Anambra in other states in the South East.
“We want to start early; we want to strategize early; we want to plan early; we want to be confident that after we have done our field work and the reward from the field work is commensurate with the efforts that we have put in. I want to be partisan here, we want a situation where we will win handsomely in the South East.
“l mentioned the South South when l started. The circumstances are slightly different but we are going to have the same type of strategic team for the S/S. The issues are different, the environment is different, the circumstances are different but it is necessary also that we bind the S/S into the national power framework that we expect to emerge in 2019.”
The Anambra governorship election was conducted November 18 last year. It was won by the All Progressive Grand Alliance, APGA candidate, Chief Willie Obiano.
The candidate of the APC, Hon. Tony Nwoye came a distance second in that election.
Speaking with journalists after the inauguration of the Committee, the chairman, Niyi Adebayo assured the APC National Working Committee that his Committee would do its best.
He said, “We will delve deeply into the matter of Anambra governorship election.”
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