While, the just concluded 2015 general election where the ruling party Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) lost the presidential elections to the opposition party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) still a topic for discussion and analysis, Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah has given seven reasons by the PDP lost the elections.
Kukah, the Roman Catholic’s Bishop of Sokoto, gave these reasons during a speech he presented at the Ebonyi State University convocation ceremony on Friday, April 24, 2015, he was a special guest.
Here are here are Rev. Kukah’s simplified 7 reasons why the party lost the elections:
1. Greed
2. Arrogance
3. Lack of party cohesion
4. Insensitivity to supporters
5. Inability to control party men
6. Saw itself as a distribution agency
7. A poor foundation.
“PDP was really not a party and never worked hard to become a party,” he said.
Speaking on the topic: Transition To Democracy: Can Nigeria Ride The Wave?, Kukah said “Successful transitions are based on the typology of the transition. Was it negotiated as it was in South Africa or is it an emergency transition? I don’t believe we have a transition in Nigeria, because I followed the circumstances that brought in Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo and I know the story pretty well.
“But what we had was really an attempt at becoming a democracy. PDP has reaped the ill-wind it sowed because clearly PDP was really not a party and it never worked hard to become a party. It became a distribution agency.
“It is true that these elections could have swung either way. Many would argue that President Goodluck Jonathan and his PDP could have won the elections had they not succumbed to the hubris that has become the hallmark of the PDP. We all know the story of the peculiar circumstances that brought the party into being.
“We also know that despite that, the party became an association of takers and buccaneers more than anything else. The party could not deal quickly with the issues of greed and arrogance of some of its men and women in power.
“The party could not control the excesses of some of its ministers and henchmen/women. It simply saw itself as presiding over a distribution agency.”
