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The Real Reason Behind PDP’s Announced ‘Shutdown’ Of Its @PDPNigeria Twitter Handle

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Nigeria’s leading opposition, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) announced late Tuesday, April 18, 2016 that it was shutting down it’s official and verified Twitter handle, @PDPNigeria, due to “recent activities on the handle”.

Curiously, the statement wasn’t made by the official spokesperson of the party, Chief Olisa Metuh but was made by Chinwe Nnorom, the head of PDP’s publicity division.

Using the party’s Facebook page, Nnorom said that the handle was “compromised sometime last year” and the party had issued a statement in that regard. The statement made reference to last year’s alert and then it went on to announce the “shutdown” of the handle, which is still active as at Tuesday evening.

The statement read, “The general public may wish to recall that the official twitter handle of our great Party, the Peoples Democratic Party, @PDPNigeria was compromised sometime last year and a statement was issued to that regard to alert unsuspecting members of the public.

“However, in view of the recent activities on the handle, I have been directed again to emphasize the shutdown of this twitter account. “All tweets and any communication from the handle @PDPNigeria does not represent the views of the Party forthwith.

We will inform the general public of a new twitter account soon. Thanks for your understanding.”

Our investigations into this development reveals that the activities of the Twitter handle, which is vibrantly opposed to the government of Muhammadu Buhari, is a source of unease for the current PDP chairman, Ali Modu Sherrif, who himself is an in-law to Buhari and co-founder of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Insiders in the PDP tell The Trent that Sherrif has been told he “cannot buy” the online supporters of the PDP as he is reportedly doing to the traditional PDP structures and as such he wishes to create a new online structure for the party to be championed by his personal media aide, Adam Kolo.

Adam Kolo is a die-hard Buharideen and APC supporter. His anti-PDP antecedents were brought to the attention of Sherrif at a meeting with the strategy division of the party last week. Kolo, broke down in tears at the meeting and claimed that he had switched sides from APC to PDP. But the PDP loyalists at the meeting were not buying his show of remorse, he was asked to publicly declare his allegiance with the PDP.

According to our sources, Kolo has refused to denounce APC, rather, he wants to “eat his cake and still have it” by using his closeness with Sherrif to fight the PDP from within. The matter that vexes Kolo, PDP insiders reveal, is that the @PDPNigeria Twitter handle is being used to expose corruption in the Buhari government.

“The decision to attack the social media arm of the PDP was hatched in the coven of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the aim is to stop Buhari’s corruption from being exposed,” our source, who works in the PDP strategy and social media division said.

“Adam Kolo, an unrepentant Buharideen, is behind this latest mechanism to shut down PDP’s online voice. They can’t get Metuh to side with them so they decided to use a staff of PDP who looks up to SAS (Senator Ali Modu Sherrif) as a god, since he has been paying their salaries after Uche Secondus blew away N9 billion in the PDP account,” another source told The Trent.

“This move only goes to confirm suspicion in the party that Sherrif is Buhari’s mole in the PDP to destroy the PDP and prevent it from functioning effectively as an opposition party,” another PDP source told our reporter.

Most recently, the handle exposed the extent of round-tripping in millions of dollars being carried out by agents of Nigeria’s first lady, Aisha Buhari, presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu, the president’s chief of staff and interior minister. The PDP social media team was also instrumental in exposing the atrocities of the APC during the Bayelsa governorship elections and the Rivers legislative re-run elections.

As at the time of filing this report, our messages to the official spokesman of the PDP, Chief Metuh have gone unanswered.

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