The leadership crisis in the Labour Party deepened on Monday as the Nenadi Usman-led National Working Committee called for the arrest and prosecution of the party’s former National Chairman, Julius Abure, over an alleged invasion of the party’s national secretariat in Abuja.

Addressing a press conference at the secretariat, the new leadership accused Abure and his loyalists of attacking the premises, threatening party officials, and removing sensitive materials.

The party alleged that properties and billboards bearing the image of Interim National Chairman Nenadi Usman were destroyed, while laptops and financial documents were carted away.

Usman said the party had petitioned the Inspector-General of Police, the Department of State Services, and other security agencies to take action.

She said, “We demand the immediate arrest and prosecution of Julius Abure and others for criminal invasion, contempt of court, impersonation, and threats to constitutional democracy in Nigeria.

“Nigeria is a constitutional democracy governed by laws, not a chaotic arena of impunity, terrorism, and brigandage as imagined by Mr Julius Abure and others.”

The interim national chairman added that the alleged operation by Abure’s supporters “lasted for over 30 minutes” and that they made away with “sensitive party documents, financial records, official registration materials, laptops, desktops, phones, and other critical assets.”

“This confirms a disturbing pattern of impunity and disregard for lawful authority. To confirm that they had carried out a criminal operation at the party’s national secretariat, they made posts on the night of the operation through various social media handles, practically indicting themselves.

“Their subsequent press statements issued from an undisclosed hideout are a gross misrepresentation of facts and continued impersonation in defiance of binding judicial pronouncements and INEC’s position as a regulator of political parties in Nigeria,” she stated.

However, Abure’s camp dismissed the allegations in a statement signed by the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Obiora Ifoh.

“The attention of the leadership of the Labour Party has been drawn to an unsigned press conference purportedly by one Nenadi Usman and her cohorts, which talked about the invasion of the Labour Party’s national headquarters as well as a case of forgery and so on.

“We need to state very clearly that the tone of the press conference was not only fallacious and laughable but one that must be dismissed with a wave of the hand,” the statement read.

The faction alleged that some persons scaled the fence of the secretariat around 1 a.m. on February 10 and pulled down the party’s billboard before erecting Usman’s own.

Ifoh questioned how Usman gained access to the offices, insisting that there was no formal handover of the secretariat.

“As far as we know, we did not hand over the secretariat to Nenadi Usman, and there was actually no need for that because judicial proceedings were ongoing. Until the final determination of the matter at the appellate courts, he cannot claim to be the rightful possessor of the office.

“We have since stayed the execution of the judgment of the lower court and appealed because we believe that justice was denied us at the lower court.

“We are therefore calling on the members of the public to disregard the content of that press conference as it was ill-advised, done in bad faith, and was also an attempt to portray the leadership of the party in a bad light,” he noted.

The fresh exchange highlights the deepening division within the Labour Party as both factions continue to lay claim to the party’s leadership. (The PUNCH)

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