The Abia State Government has raised doubts about Senator Orji Uzor Kalu’s loyalty to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, pointing to the outcome of the 2023 general elections in which Kalu secured his senatorial seat but failed to deliver his constituency for the APC presidential candidate.
The state government’s response follows Kalu’s recent assertion that the All Progressives Congress (APC) would reclaim Abia State in 2027 and remove Governor Alex Otti from office.
Representing Abia North Senatorial District, Kalu had pledged to mobilise support for the APC ahead of the next election cycle, insisting that while he maintains a personal friendship with Governor Otti, his political allegiance remains strictly with his party.
According to him, he would campaign for President Tinubu’s success in Abia State and work for any APC governorship candidate to emerge victorious in 2027.
However, the Abia State Government, through a statement issued by the Governor’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Ferdinand Ekeoma, challenged Kalu to substantiate his claims of political influence with concrete electoral evidence.
The statement noted that the APC recorded what it described as heavy defeats in Kalu’s constituency during both the presidential and governorship elections in 2023.
The government also clarified that Governor Otti never sought Kalu’s support for his election nor attempted to pressure him into working against his party.
According to the statement, Kalu’s repeated emphasis on refusing to support Governor Otti against his party has become routine and unnecessary.
It further warned that if such remarks were intended as indirect threats, they would have the opposite effect, stressing that intimidation would only strengthen rather than weaken the governor.
Questioning Kalu’s claim that he actively worked for President Tinubu in the last election, the Abia government urged him to publicly release his polling unit and ward-level results.
The statement asked how the president could lose in Kalu’s constituency while the senator won his own election conducted on the same day, if indeed he mobilised support for the APC presidential ticket.
The Otti-led administration maintained that the governor’s 2023 victory was driven by his credibility, competence, and campaign vision, noting that he emerged as the only Labour Party governor in Nigeria.
It expressed confidence that Abia residents, having witnessed what it described as sustained development and transformation under Otti in less than three years, would overwhelmingly renew his mandate in 2027.
The government also took aim at the political ambitions of the Kalu family, recalling that the senator’s younger brother, Mascot Kalu, contested the 2023 governorship election under the Action Peoples Party (APP) and finished at the bottom of the race.
It sarcastically congratulated Senator Kalu for allegedly positioning his brother for the 2027 governorship contest, noting that Mascot Kalu secured only 11,728 votes — representing 3.3 percent of the total votes cast — in the last election.
The statement further revealed that four aspirants have already declared interest in the Abia North senatorial seat on the platform of the Labour Party, adding that whoever emerges would receive Governor Otti’s full backing.
Recall that during the March 18, 2023 governorship election, Alex Otti polled 175,466 votes to defeat the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Okey Ahiwe, who garnered 88,526 votes.
© 2025 Gossip News Now, a division of CHIEJOS HARBIAN DIGITAL MEDIA LTD. Contact us via admin@gossipnewsnow.online
