302 Rivers Councillors To Defect To APC

Plans have reached an advanced stage for more than 302 councillors in Rivers State to defect to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the next few days.
Disclosing this to newsmen in Port Harcourt, Chairman of the National Councillors Forum of Nigeria, Rivers State chapter, Hon. Lesor Nwigbaranee, said that the decampment was as a result of the multiple crises rocking the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the state and national levels.
He said the expulsion of their leader, Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi and the continued crisis in the state were clear indications that the party was grinding to an inevitable halt.
The chairman stated that the councillors, who are mostly young men, cannot afford to put their fate in a torn and tattered umbrella that could neither shield members from sun nor rain.
He further stated that the decampment would not only affect the councillors but also the large grassroots supporters of PDP that had hitherto given a sense of invincibility to the party in the state.
Nwigbaranee said by the time the process of decamping was concluded, the fate of PDP would have been sealed, and the party would no longer sustain its winning streak in the state as the orientation of Rivers people will change for a long time to come.
“Nobody will say again that Rivers people are traditional PDP voters”, he stated.
He said that the councillors debated and consulted the people of the grassroots before taking the decision to decamp to APC.
According to him, a lot of Rivers people at the grassroots were asking: What has the Rivers man benefited from Jonathan’s Presidency?
He said states like Rivers ought to have two or three flyovers criss-crossing the city from President Jonathan, adding that the former military President Ibrahim Babangida singlehandedly changed the face of Minna, Niger State.
The chairman of Rivers’ Councillors Forum said that nothing stopped the Federal Government from constructing new flyovers at strategic locations on Port Harcourt/Aba Expressway as well as Ikwerre Road/Airport-Owerri Road to ease traffic flow on the two key federal highways.
He noted that there was hardly any Federal Government presence in terms of physical infrastructure projects in the state, adding that the Amaechi-led administration was yet to be reimbursed funds expended on most of the federal projects embarked upon by the state government on behalf of the Federal Government.
Nwigbaranee said they would have been hearing plans of the President to transform Rivers, Bayelsa and other South-South states but instead the little meant for Rivers State was being stalled for mere political differences with Governor Amaechi.
“It is unfair and against the unity of South-south, if this is the case, we Rivers people will chart our cause and progress independently and I am sure we will develop faster”, he stated.