Labour Party (LP) suffered a huge blow on Thursday as five of its Representatives in the lower house of the National Assembly dumped the party and joined the All Progressives Congress (APC) at plenary.
The lawmakers are: Chinedu Okere (Owerri municipal constituency); Mathew Donatus (Kaura Federal Constituency of Kaduna);,Akiba Bassey (Calabar municipal Constituency), and Esosa Iyawe (Oredo constituency of Edo)
Also, Erhiatake Ibori-Suenu (Delta), a lawmaker and daughter of former Delta State Governor, James Ibori, dumped the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the APC.
The now-former Labour Party lawmakers cited division within their party as the main reason for their defection.
After over 20 years of its formation, pro-workers political organisation, Labour Party (LP) made inroads into mainstream politics during the 2023 elections as the party got six Senate and over 34 House of Representatives seats.
Compared to its phenomenal stride in the 2023 elections, the LP did not get a single seat in the 2019 National Assembly elections.
With the party’s presidential candidate Peter Obi coming third during the poll, many had thought that the Labour Party would form a formidable opposition alongside the PDP against the ruling APC but intra-party squabbles after the general elections have plagued the party.
