The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State is currently experiencing a new crisis among its members.

This is because Tony Okocha, the former chief of staff to former governor Rotimi Amaechi, has now formally assumed the position of APC leader in the state.

In a press conference with the media on Sunday in Port Harcourt, Okocha asserted that Amaechi's purported order for APC members to vote against the party's then-presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu, in the recently concluded elections was the reason for his ascent to the position of APC leader in the state.

“A day before the presidential election, he ordered his supporters to vote for the candidates of the PDP." We also have it on record that he also voted for the candidate of the PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.

“That necessarily, by nature, disqualifies him as the leader. And that I, Chief Tony Okocha, who won election with my own faction for our presidential candidate, am now the leader of APC in Rivers State,” he claimed.

But reacting to Okocha’s self-enthronement, the Publicity Secretary of the APC in Rivers State, Darlington Nwauju, insisted that the former Chief of Staff to Amaechi is not a member of the party in the state.

Nwauju stated that Okocha is just a member of an independent campaign outfit for Tinubu-Shettima in the just concluded presidential election.

He said Okocha cannot mention the names of the five executive members of the APC in his ward, describing him as a transactional politician.

According to him, “Are you not aware that the campaign outfit that he belongs to here in Rivers State is torn apart because of money allegedly donated to them by the Governor of Rivers State?"

“Please remind Tony Okocha that when the pillars of APC in Nigeria sit to discuss, he won’t be there."

“And let us also put this on record that one million Tony Okochas cannot distract Rivers APC from winning the election on March 11, 2023.”

Okocha is among members of the APC in Rivers State who reportedly failed to participate in the party’s membership revalidation exercise carried out in 2021.