Anambra guber: Nwosu kicks as LP faction elects Umennajiego party candidate

By Aloysius Attah, Onitsha

The Anambra State chapter of the Labour Party (LP) has named Hon. Jude Umennajiego its candidate after a factional primary election in Awka on Thursday. This was to select the party’s contender for the November 8 governorship election.

This follows last Saturday’s primary, where Dr George Moghalu was chosen as the LP candidate. Mr John Nwosu had withdrawn from that election, citing irregularities and the incompetence of the Julius Abure-led faction, sacked by the Supreme Court.

In Thursday’s primary, Nwosu, represented at the event, polled 69 votes. Umennajiego, a serving Anambra State House of Assembly member described by sources as a placeholder, secured 180 votes. Acting chairman of the electoral committee, Amb. Sunday Okereke, announced, “With the powers conferred on me by the Electoral Act 2022, and the guidelines of our party, I hereby declare and return Hon Jude Umennajiego as the duly elected candidate of Labour Party for the November 8, 2025.”

Umennajiego pledged to work hard for the party’s victory. “LP will use Anambra as a model to showcase the party’s plan to turn Nigeria around from a consumption to a production nation,” he said in his acceptance speech. He also named Hon. Henry Mbachu, another assembly member from Awka South 1, as his running mate.

However, Nwosu rejected Umennajiego’s nomination in a statement issued shortly after. He vowed to challenge the outcome through an appeal. “I recognize that the Supreme Court Judgment of the 4th day of April, 2025 voided the 5th April, 2025 Labour Party Primary Election in all its ramifications,” he said.

“I did not participate in the 5th April, 2025 Labour Party Primary Election in Anambra State in deference to the Supreme Court Judgment and attendant irregularities and illegalities in the planning of that Primary Election,” he added. “I had accordingly forwarded my Letter of Withdrawal pertinent to the relevant authorities of Labour Party and asserted my willingness to participate in future process that are credible and transparent.”

Nwosu welcomed the National Caretaker Committee (NCC) decisions from its 9 April 2025 meeting in Abuja. “Consequently, my Letter of the 8th April, 2025 to the NCC indicating my willingness and my prima facie qualification to participate in the Primary Election to be conducted by the seven-man designated Electoral Committee Chair by Hon Iheanacho Obioma officials on the 10th of April, 2025 in Awka, remains valid and subsisting,” he stated.

He argued, “I am of the view that I am the only Aspirant of Labour Party, who have met all the Guidelines and Timelines stipulated by Labour Party and INEC pertinent to the Labour Party Primary Election, 2025.”
Nwosu further claimed that Thursday’s primary aimed to ensure a transparent process.

“Consequent to the outcome of the Primaries, which, produced a placeholder, I hereby reserve my option to appeal the outcome and pursue to the full extent of the Law measures that will protect due process and my rights in this regard,” he concluded.