the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Mr. Otti, who made his declaration on Friday at his Ehi na Uguru Ward 5,
in Isiala Ngwa South Local Government Area, promised to keep fighting to
salvage the state from the grips of endless bad governance.
He said he was joining APC for the good of his people, saying “we must
always put the people first.”
He said his decision to leave APGA was not an easy one, neither was it
one that he made overnight.
He said it was a decision made based on my unshakable belief that it is
for the good of my beloved state and people of Abia.
Mr. Otti said he was joining APC alongside about 450,000 members of
APGA, who were loyal to him.
He decried the level of insecurity, decayed infrastructure,
unemployment, unpaid salaries and pensions, endemic poverty among others
as some of the challenges crippling the state.
Mr. Otti expressed dismay that the state now occupied a very low
position in the ranking of states in the Human Development Index because
of bad leadership.
He said, “I have, therefore, chosen to keep on fighting in order to
liberate our people and make them achieve their full potential as human
beings and rightful citizens of Nigeria and the World.
“As our people say, if you embark on a journey, you must be walking
until you get to your destination.
“We have not arrived yet, so we keep walking. We are a great people and
we know it. It is our destiny.
“It is the great task of our lives. We must lead our people to the
promised land.”
Mr. Otti, a former Managing Director of the defunct Diamond Bank Plc,
pledged to use his vast experience and contacts in the finance and
management industry to attract massive investments to industrialise the
state.
Earlier, Nnamdi Francis the Ward 5 Chairman of APC, while presenting Mr.
Otti to the party, described him as a ‘big fish’, who would help to
reposition the party in the state.
Mr. Otti was later welcomed at the party’s state secretariat in Umuahia,
by the APC stakeholders.
The state Chairman of APC, Donatus Nwamkpa, while welcoming Mr. Otti
said there was no discrimination at the party.
“We have always longed to have you in our midst because our mission is
to rescue Abia,” he said.
Mr. Nwamkpa, however, said APC had no automatic ticket for anybody.
He told Mr. Otti that every member of the party was important while
assuring him that he would not suffer any form of discrimination in the
party.
(NAN)