By Steve Oni, Ilorin
About three thousand members of the All Progressives Change (APC) in Kwara state have dumped the party and joined the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
The Sunday’s defection brought the number of defectors from APC to the ruling PDP in the state to about 4000.
About 800 former loyalists of an APC stalwart, Prof Shuaib AbdulRaheem, had last week, in two instalments defected to the PDP.
The defectors gave the internal wrangling among their leaders as well as lack of unity of purpose among them as reasons for their action.
Receiving the defectors in Ilorin, the state capital, the national leader of the PDP and President of the Senate, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki has assured Kwarans that a new administration under the PDP in 2019 will benefit them than the incumbent APC.
Saraki, while addressing the former APC members said the PDP remains the only hope for true representation of the people of Kwara at the federal level.
He assured them that unlike his former association with the APC, he was sure of the people leading the PDP now as well as its presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar whom he noted has great plans for the state.
There is no Kwaran in the APC who has sufficient clout to influence issues for Kwara at the federal level, he said, warning that it would be a great mistake for anyone in the state to trust the ruling federal party.
The Senate President also asked the new returnees to see themselves as part and parcel of his political structure and challenged them to go out and bring others like them whom he noted have been well deceived by the APC.
The defectors were drawn from various areas of Kwara central senatorial district.
Ends
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