Crisis looms in Gombe APC over unpaid rally allowance  

Aggrieved supporters of the All Progressive Congress (APC) in Gombe state are planning to stage a protest at the APC Presidential and gubernatorial campaign secretariat, popularly known as APC Square.

The protest, according to a source, is to draw attention to the refusal of the party campaign organization to pay their rally allowances during the state gubernatorial launch in Kaltungo last week.

It was reliably gathered that the angry supporters, who are mostly women and youths are angry over alleged poor treatment being meted to them by the officials of the party and campaign council in Kaltungo.

Some of the  representatives of the youths that spoke to newsmen in confidence said they were not paid their allowances for their trip and feeding to Kaltungo last week Thursday.

“We mobilised and went to the rally hoping we will be paid, but the officials have told us that they converted the allowances to feeding, something they didn’t discuss with us beforehand,”

“We deserved to be paid in Kaltungo considering the risk we took”, the source said.

According to him some of the supporters at the rally were “contract supporters,” not genuine APC supporters, as such they deserve their N2000 agreed allowance.

“They promised they will pay us as soon as we reach Kaltungo, but until now we haven’t seen one Naira”, he said.

He said they are planning to stage the protest to draw the attention of Alhaji Mohammed Inuwa Yahaya the party’s Gubernatorial candidate, with the hope that he will quickly intervene and correct the abnormally.

“We hope that the gubernatorial candidate can come to our rescue. We are responsible family men and women”, he said.

All efforts made to have any of the party officials to speak about the matter proved abortive.

Meanwhile the Gombe state director media and publicity committee of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) campaign organization, Dahiru Hassan Kera, says PDP will retain power in the state and also regain the Presidential seat because  “Nigerians have now discovered that APC is a political party founded on deceit”.

Kera said : “What happened  in Kaltungo last week has opened the eyes of the people of Gombe. They  have lost faith in APC. They clearly saw the deceit of APC and they are regretting.”

While calling on Nigerians not to be deceived by the ‘security and anti-corruption’ slogan of the APC, he said, “we are equally extending our invitation to all those in the APC who are frustrated by the party’s failure to deliver the goods. Any one who is desirous of a return to the era of abundance and freedom under the PDP administration is welcome. The umbrella is big enough to accommodate all,” he said.