The Labour Party on Tuesday announced that the cost of nomination and expression of interest forms for its governorship aspirants interested in contesting the off-season elections in Bayelsa, Kogi, and Imo states has been pegged at N15 million naira.
The cost of the forms, which was formally pegged at N25 million was slashed to N15 million to allow for more participation.
The party national chairman, Julius Abure, revealed this while addressing journalists shortly after the political roundtable at Denis Hotel, venue of the closed-door meeting between the Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi and the LP senators and House of Representatives members-elect in Abuja.
Reports from the occasion reveal that there were stern-looking security agents, who mounted guards at each entrance to the venue and were seen frisking participants and guests coming for the event.
The heavy flow of both human and vehicular traffic caused a bit of stir as bystanders and residents in the area watched as the politicians strolled into the venue with their orderlies.
But when Obi turned up for the meeting, the ambience was charged with many party supporters screaming ‘Peter Obi’ and ‘Ellu P.’
The parley, which was held to fine-tune strategies ahead of the inauguration of lawmakers for the 10th National Assembly, failed to commence at 12 noon as earlier scheduled.
Abure stated that both Obi and the party’s National Working Committee were impressed with the quality, willingness to address issues and composition of the new lawmakers-elect.
He said, “Today, we had a very robust engagement with our senators and House of Representatives members-elect. We agreed that we must always remember the magnanimity of the people who freely gave us their mandate.
“Our members in the National Assembly will make the difference in their conduct, utterance and the quality of legislation.”
Continuing, Abure also announced a slash in the cost of nomination and expression of interest forms for the LP governorship aspirants interested in contesting the off-season elections in Bayelsa, Kogi, and Imo.
He said, “After considering the complaints and the intervention of our presidential candidate, Mr. Peter Obi, we have reviewed downward our governorship nomination fees, for Bayelsa, Kogi, and Imo, we have reduced our nomination fees from N25 million to N15 million for the governorship.
“We have also resolved to return the N25 million nomination fees paid by one of our aspirants in Imo State, Humphrey Anumudu who lost his life last week.”