Former Chief of Staff, CoS, to former Governor Theodore Orji of Abia State, Chief Mascot Kalu, has clinched the governorship ticket of the Action Peoples Party, APP, in Abia State for the 2023 general election.
Mascot Kalu’s was returned unopposed at the party’s primary held in Umuahia, the Abia State capital, after the second aspirant for the position, Ndem Chukwu, announced his withdrawal from the race at the venue of the election and threw his support behind Mascot Kalu.
In his acceptance speech, Mascot, who is the younger brother to the Chief Whip of the Nigerian Senate, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu, lamented that the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has failed to develop Abia State due to Governor Okezie Ikpeazu-led administration ineptitude and gross mismanagement of the enormous human and material resources of the state.
He accused the state governor, Okezie Ikpeazu, of failing to pay salaries and pensions, as at when due; impoverishing the people of the state and abandoning the social infrastructures of the state to dilapidate and thereby making Abia State the most underdeveloped state in the south east zone of the country.
He expressed his preparedness to help in the onerous task of rebuilding the state, noting that he has an edge over other governorship candidates, and that his rich political experience and antecedent as a former chief of staff is his greatest selling point.
Kalu disclosed that his party, the Action Peoples Party, APP, has great prospects since it could fill all the elective positions for the general election within two months of its inception in the state
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He expressed confidence that his party has the capacity to win the forthcoming 2023 election in the state, and that the Electoral Act will make positive impact in terms of conducting free, fair and credible elections.
He said that they have about nine months to grow the party further, in terms of membership and capacity.