Don’t drag us backward, Enoh tells aggrieved C’River APC chieftains

• Disagrees with group over his inclusion in reconciliation committee

A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Cross River State, John Owan Enoh has enjoined aggrieved members of the party to stop undermining the party at the state and national levels.

Enoh, who was APC governorship candidate in Cross River State in the 2019 elections, expressed optimism that ongoing effort by the Adams Oshiomhole-led National Working Committee (NWC) to reconcile aggrieved members of the party would achieve the desired results.

In a statement in Calabar at the weekend, he cautioned those working with former Minister of Niger Delta, Usani Uguru Usani to sabotage the reconciliatory effort to desist from doing so in the overall interest of the party.

Enoh who was responding to a petition filed against his inclusion as member of the APC National Reconciliation Committee (NRC) headed by Senate President, Ahmed Lawan, insisted that he qualified to be in the committee.

 A group known as the Concerned Members of the All Progressives Congress, Cross River State had petitioned the NWC asking for the review of the membership of the NRC, and withdrawal of Enoh’s name from the committee.

According to the group, Enoh does not have the credentials to be a member of the NRC, since he was also part of the crisis in the state’s APC.

In the petition sent to the office of the APC National Chairman, which was signed by Busa Thomas Osowo Bisong and Kingsley A. Ebuka, the group alleged that among other things, Enoh was not a loyal party member.

The group has insisted that members of the reconciliation committee should comprise party men and women of proven character and whose participation and contribution to the party is consistent and traceable to the merger of 2014, saying Enoh joined the party only in 2018.

But Enoh argued otherwise, insisting, “While reconciliation is crucial and imminent in politics, a reconciliatory process should not be carried out to evoke provocation and abuse the sensibilities of the various actors and interest groups.

He noted: “The tactics of the petitioners appear intended to mask their moral deficiencies as they keep reveling in their pervasive penchant to distort facts.

“Their baseless allegations were framed with the purpose of distracting and diverting the attention of the party from the central issue of reconciling all aggrieved members.”