By Ebuka Onyekwelu, Ph.D
The senator representing Anambra Central senatorial district, Chief Victor Umeh, was forced this morning by Rufai Oseni of Arise TV to withdraw his statement that his co-aspirant is “a small boy.” Mr. Umeh, a former National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance – APGA, emerged as party national chairman at just 38 years old. Ironically, he was calling Mr. Nonso Nwabueze Oli, who is at least in his mid-40s, a small boy on national TV.
As a part of the fallout from the Nigeria Democracy Congress – NDC, primaries three weeks ago, Mr. Nwabueze Oli, who contested against Senator Victor Umeh in the party primary, was reported at various quarters as the winner of the primary. However, Victor Umeh is also claiming to have won the primary election. Mr. Oli had taken it a bit further by frontally campaigning against Umeh, insisting that he has not given a good account of himself in the Senate. This was the conversation on Arise TV’s Morning Show that featured Senator Umeh, who came to respond to some of the issues raised against him by Mr. Oli. Nevertheless, Umeh’s comment that Oli is “a small boy” prompted Rufai Oseni to demand an immediate retraction of the comment, and Umeh obliged. “Stop calling a co-aspirant a boy,” Rufai said. In response, “No, to me, he is a young man. You saw him here calling my name, “Victor Umeh, Victor Umeh, I have not met him. Okay, I withdraw it”, Umeh replied.
It would be recalled that before the 2023 General Election, Senator Victor Umeh, then an aspirant in APGA, went on a TV programme on Anambra Broadcasting Service in Awka and referred to his then fellow aspirants in APGA, Chief Uzu Okagbue and Hon. Dozie Nwankwo, who were in their 40s at the time, as “small children, who should not be competing with him.”
Ahead of the 2027 General Election, as the candidate of the NDC, Senator Victor Umeh’s main challenger would be Hon. Dozie Nwankwo, the APGA candidate for Anambra Central senatorial district, who had served for two terms at the Nigerian House of Representatives.
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