APC blasts Amaechi’s critics over funding

From Ayodele Samuel, Lagos with agency report

The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers state has taken a swipe at the critics of the state governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, who accused him of funding the party at the national level.

The state chapter of APC described the claim as lacking in foundation and a figment of the imagination of the governor’s critics, adding that the allegation was based on mere suspicion as a result of the key role the governor has been playing in the party.

The state Chairman of the APC, Chief Davies Ikanya, said yesterday, in a statement signed by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Public Affairs, Chukwuemeka Eze, that the APC remained a political party too big to be funded by the state.

“This is a rumour without foundation and a figment of the imagination of those who invented it. It is based on mere suspicion because of the key role that Governor Amaechi has been playing in repositioning APC to salvage Nigeria from the  grip of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party.

“As rightly stated by Governor Amaechi on Monday, during the APC Port Harcourt flag-off rally, APC is a very big party to be funded from the purse of the Rivers State Government,” Ikanya said.

Ikanya pointed out that the state did not have the huge sum of money those behind the rumour claimed the governor had spent on the APC at the national level.

“Rivers is not the richest state in either the country or the APC, it is not. For example, is there anywhere as rich as Lagos, which is an APC state, and very much committed to the progress of the party?

“The truth is that no single state or individual is funding APC; the party is funded by all its committed members,” the state party chairman said.

Ikanya stated that much of Rivers money had been taken away by the PDP-controlled Federal Government through declining monthly allocation and the ceding of some of the state’s oil wells to neighbouring Abia and Bayelsa states.”