Former governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State, Tonye Cole, has said that the Governor of Rivers State, Siminalayi Fubara, cannot be recognised as a lawful member of the APC in Rivers.<\/p>\n
Speaking during an appearance on Channels Television, Cole stated that Fubara aligned himself with the wrong faction.<\/p>\n
Abia Radio News<\/strong> reports that Fubara defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the APC in December 2025, a move publicly welcomed by the party\u2019s national leadership.<\/p>\n He was subsequently presented with his APC membership card by Tony Okocha, who leads a party faction in Rivers.<\/p>\n However, Cole stated that the Emeka Beke-led group remains the legitimate leadership of the APC in Rivers.<\/p>\n Cole said the governor made the \u201cwrong\u201d choice by joining the Okocha faction.<\/p>\n He insisted that Fubara cannot be lawfully recognised as a member of the APC in Rivers until he aligns with the Beke-led faction.<\/p>\n Cole, however, noted that Fubara\u2019s defection itself was a smart political decision.<\/p>\n He said, \u201cWho is welcoming him (Fubara) to the APC? Who is the one issuing him the membership card? Where is he registered under? Now, Tony Okocha is not a legally recognised faction of the APC, and that is where the problem is.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cEven though he (Fubara) is recognised nationally as a member of the APC, the group that has welcomed him is not legally recognised.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cHe should come. We will recognise and welcome him because we have the legal standing to do so. He is not safe where he is.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Cole warned that the APC must avoid a repeat of the 2019 election crisis, when a court barred the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from recognising the party\u2019s candidates in Rivers State.<\/p>\n \n <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Former governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State, Tonye Cole, has said that the Governor of Rivers State, Siminalayi Fubara, cannot be recognised as a lawful member of the APC in Rivers. Speaking during an appearance on Channels Television, Cole stated that Fubara aligned himself with the wrong faction. Abia Radio […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":239078,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5],"tags":[287,606,1864,1444],"class_list":["post-239077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-apc","tag-rivers-state","tag-siminalayi-fubara","tag-tonye-cole"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Tonye-Cole.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}