How prepared is
your party to
contest the 2012 governorship elections?
When we were preparing for, 2011 elections, we prepared also in these states where elections are to hold next year. We have held primaries in those states. However, because of the court judgment, we have to stop the processes. What we are doing now is to improve on the arrangements we have made earlier.
Now we have to do another primary because the exercise is now in the past. We cannot use it for the new elections because there may be some of our members who would want to contest for those positions. We are going to fix the date for our primary very soon. The National Executive of the party will meet and fix the dates. We have already written to the states involved, so that they will start mobilisation.
When is it likely that the primaries would hold?
The NEC has to sit and decide; you know it is not what you will sit down as the chairman or the secretary and decide. The NEC has to meet and agree, but if the NEC will not be able to sit, the NWC will meet and map out strategies because it involves logistics. If you are going to do primaries, you are going to start from ward level to local government level, then to state level.
At times, you even have to write to the police if you think there is going to be breach of order. You have to equally inform INEC about the time the primaries would take place, so it is not something that one person will just decide. The states involved will equally come and say the time that will be convenient for them to do the primaries. So these are the things that we have to put in place before the primaries are held.
APGA is going to contest with bigger parties like the PDP. What strategy have you adopted to ensure victory?
The strategy we have adopted now is person to person campaign. We are meeting the various town unions in those states, who will equally mobilise their own individual households and the different association that they belong to. But our interest is to establish interpersonal relationship with the electorates.
Our plan is to capture the grass roots; it is not just all about going to the media, but approaching the target; that is the individual persons and convincing them one on one to support the party. The indigenes of those states are so much enthusiastic about APGA. We have very strong membership in all the states.
Do you have intention to merge with other opposition parties for the elections?
APGA does not believe in winning elections at all cost. Going in for merger means that we are going in just to win the elections at all cost. We want to sell a product that over the years, people will say yes this is what APGA stands for; we can only work in alliances with other political parties when ideologies are the same or when what we what to do for the masses are the same, but the issue of merger cannot come in.
How can we be talking about merger in a governorship election? If it is a presidential election, we can say yes it worth it. We started with Anambra state, now we are in Imo and by 2015 we will go beyond that. So working in alliance in those states, I do not see the chances of merger except if things will change tomorrow because in politics you don’t see it all until you get to the situation. Even if other parties should unite against what APGA stands for, so be it.
There is no way we can subsume APGA into another party. If we merge then which platform will we be selling? Is it APGA or the other party? However, if the other party says ‘yes we can take APGA as our platform to run for the elections’, then fine and good. But for us to say that we will relinquish our structures, logo, and manifesto and go for another political party, it may not work for us because we want to build this party over the years. Even if we are not able to win the elections, the most important thing is to make sure that the wheel of democracy progresses from one level to the other.
Do you accept the voter register as it is?
We would have liked a situation whereby a good and up to date voter register is prepared for the elections, but there is no way you will have a percent fraud free register. It is not possible, considering the timeframe for the election. If it is an election that will take place 2015, then you can see the possibility of up to date register because INEC will start now to an prepare, considering the logistics that are involved.
It is not possible to get that kind of documentation within this space of time. So I think we should make do with what is on the ground. However, if we see anything that will mar the election we will oppose it.
Do you trust INEC as a body especially against the backdrop of allegations of malpractice in the last elections?
By the time the processes and the campaigns start, we will be getting information from the field and with them we will be able to have the capacity to judge the commission. We believe there would be a lot of improvement from what we had in the last elections because the states are few unlike the 2011 elections where there were many states with limited logistics. This time the elections come one after the other. So if INEC was able to deliver the way it did in the last elections, I believe their will be better credibility in this ones.
However, in as much as I believe that INEC will do better this time around, I equally advise them to ensure a level playing ground for all the parties. They should not be partisan, and should checkmate anybody that tries to go against the credibility of the election.
Importantly, they should monitor the campaign expenses of all the political parties to ensure that nobody goes beyond the constitutional provisions for every political party. Parties have been neglecting that over the time. We got information that a political party gave money in dollars to buy the voters and you know people are hungry.
What are the problems facing the party as the elections approach?
The problem is usually getting trustworthy agents, because if the agents at the polling units are up and doing, if they are not people whom money can influence, then you can rest. However, if you do not have enough money to pay them, they can compromise at the polling units if they see bigger money from bigger political parties.
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