TONY JOHN, Port Harcourt
Acting Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State, Igo Aguma, has expressed concerns over the just concluded governorship election in Edo State, saying it is a lesson for the party in Rivers.
Aguma, in a press statement by his  Media Adviser, Livingstone Wechie, issued in Port Harcourt, yesterday, demonstrated the dangers of godfatherism in politics.
He noted that the highhandedness of political godfathers is destructive to collective efforts of members of the party.
The acting chairman of APC in Rivers lamented that it was the desperate will of a political godfather that denied the party chances in 2015 and 2019 general elections in the state.
“The Edo State 2020 governorship election has come and gone leaving behind a reopened memory of the fate of  All Progressives Congress APC in Rivers State,  which untill recently, has been held to ransom and is still being held to ransom by the primitive high-handedness of a godfather, who has consistently shown-off his penchant for destroying collective efforts that defy his dictates.
“The experience in Edo brings to the fore, the dangers of one man imposing both his will and way on the party to drive a personal agenda against the wishes of the majority, party members and popular interest.
“Edo 2020 reminds the Rivers APC faithful the blind horse experience of the shameful loss that characterized the 2015 and 2019 general elections, which ostensibly destroyed the political ambitions of prospective APC contestants because of the unrighteous and vicious actions of a godfather in Rivers State.
“In 2015, he dictated and imposed his will and we failed woefully.  Again in 2019, he arbitrarily imposed another of his will and APC was buried alive in Rivers State.
“It is important to note that all that transpired in Rivers state during both political/electoral calendars particularly in 2019 was because the godfather on record, indisputably vowed that nobody must have an ambition except he so wills.
“For instance,  the same godfather openly threatened that should a particular aspirant in Rivers State dared contested for the 2019 governorship election, that he, the godfather, will destroy the APC in Rivers State and today, he has brought that to fruition in his own way”, Aguma stated.
He continued: “Drawing lessons from the plight of APC in Edo 2020, APC Rivers should caution itself that the will of one man should never be allowed again to circumvent or decimate the aspirations and ambitions of others”.
According to Aguma, politics today has advanced and must be played consultatively based on constitutional democracy, carrying stakeholders and party members along.
He said: “Just as it was in Edo State, where the godfather of the incumbent was seen as the face of APC in the just concluded governorship election whether advertently or inadvertently, so has the godfather, the original problem of APC Rivers State consciously brought his ill-will to surreptitiously extend his stay in power.
“This, he has done by imposing his appendages on the APC in Rivers State resulting in the avoidable failures of the party serially, successively and back to back in all elections in the state. All in a bid to bring vendetta to those who question and tame his excesses”, Aguma maintained.
He, however, urged aggrieved party members to join him in redeeming the image of APC and ensuring its future success in Rivers.