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By Joel Anekwe
The Rivers State chapter of the All Progressives Congress, APC led by Abbott Ogbobula, has described the widely celebrated defection of former state commissioner for Health, Dr. Sampson Parker, and thousands of his supporters from the APC to PDP as a dummy to members of the public.
The former commissioner, who served under the Chibuike Amaechi administration, was announced to have last weekend defected from the APC to the PDP with about two thousand of his supporters at Okochiri, Okrika Local Government Area of the state.
But a statement by Ogbonna Nwuke, acting publicity secretary of that faction of the APC in a statement explained that the defection of Dr. Parker was not a loss in any way to APC since the former commissioner was never an APC member.
He said Dr Parker, like Governor Nyesom Wike, served in the administration of Amaechi as the state commissioner for Health, adding that prior to his elevation to the position of commissioner, Parker served as a personal doctor to Amaechi.
“When Governor Rotimi Amaechi and his friends decided to leave the PDP for the APC, Dr Parker remained stoutly in the PDP. At no time did Dr Parker, who later emerged in Abuja as a member of the Green Party after the monumental defeat of the PDP at the national level in 2015, ever join the APC. It is on record that the records of the APC, both in the Rivers State and at the national level, do not have the name of Dr Sampson Parker. This can be verified”, Nwuke declared.
He said that Dr Parker has a right to belong to any political party of his choice, “but that for a man of his status to associate himself with an open lie, knowing it to be so, in order to score cheap political points in the eyes of Governor Nyesom Wike beat the imagination of the APC.”
Nwuke added; “We wish to state categorically that since Dr Parker chose to go his own way in the years preceding 2015, he has never enjoyed any close political tie with Rotimi Amaechi. We however understand that there is an urgent propaganda need for Parker to fill from the perspective of the PDP. But our reaction is simple. Rivers people are no fools. They know who is who”.
Dr.Parker was at the weekend reported to have ditched the APC for the PDP with thousands of his supporters during which Governor Nyesom Wike in receiving him to the party praising him for taking the bold step to come back to his former party.
He recalled the role played by Dr. Parker in the emergence of former Governor Rotimi Chibike Amaechi in 2007 and that his coming back to the PDP would add value to the party.
The governor said; “Dr. Parker was one of those God used alongside some of us to bring Amaechi in as governor of Rivers State in 2007.
“We thought that from that time, everybody will be united, but we didn’t know that some persons had different plans, but God’s plan is always the best.
“When I was leaving in 2012, I told Dr. Parker that things are not moving well, and I am going. But he insisted that I should remain as there was need for us to continue to be together.
“But I am happy today that my friend and brother has realized what I told him then and has returned to the PDP.
“Dr. Parker came at the right time and nobody should discriminate him because with the level of politics he had played, he will add value to the party”, the governor said.