A fresh leadership crisis is rocking Nigeria’s main opposition party, People’s Democratic Party (PDP), as there are plans to hold a parallel national convention scheduled for May 21, 2016.
According to a senior inside source who spoke with The Trent late Tuesday, April 19, 2016, there would be two National Convention by two powerful factions of the PDP. One would be hosted by Governor Nyesom Wike in Port Harcourt while the other would be held in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory.
Impeccable sources close to the party hierarchy have revealed that two factions have emerged in the party as a group of five Governors led by Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State and Nyesom Wike of Rivers contended that the present acting chairman, Senator Ali Modu Sherrif should remain as substantive chairman while others have opposed the plan, a development which is tearing the party apart as the national convention draws near.
Our investigations reveal that that Sherrif has the support support of five PDP governors to emerge as the chairman of the party after the May 21 convention. Part of the arrangement is for Sherrif to eventually be the presidential flagbearer of the party in 2019 to square-off with the APC. Fayose has been promised the vice presidential ticket by Sherrif, inside sources reveal.
However, Dr. Olusegun Mimiko, the Ondo State governor and chairman of the PDP Governor’s Forum is leading a progressive bloc within the PDP to oppose the plans to truncate the laid down zoning arrangement by the party in which the position of national chairman rotates between North and South.
“If SAS (Senator Ali Modu Sherrif) is allowed to continue as party chairman after his tenure end in May, it means that the PDP has made nonsense of its internal zoning arrangement which could spell doom for the party in 2019 as it did in 2015,” a PDP stalwart confirmed the party crisis to The Trent said.
The Mikiko bloc, supported by party chieftains like Raymond Dokpesi is planning a parallel convention in Abuja to ensure that the plans to “retard” the PDP’s progress is not scuttled by those in support of Sherrif. The bloc believes that at this critical period that the party is battling to rescue its image and bounce back to power, the zoning principle must be maintained so as to reposition itself for the 2019 general elections.
But sources close to the Wike’s group reveal that as part of strategies to ensure the emergence of Sheriff as the substantive Chairman, the group has perfected to hold the convention in Port Harcourt.
“We have a major problem in our hands – greedy, self-centred politicians who don’t see beyond the plate of food placed before them want to sell our party to the devil,” the source told our reporter.
“The Wike group made up of Fayose, Udom, and another governor are plotting to break the party’s tradition of national chairman rotating between the North and the South. Senators like [Buruji] Kashamu, [Iyiola] Omisore are going along with this plot.
“Dokpesi, and seven PDP governors led by Mimiko reject the idea and are insisting that Sherrif must step down as agreed when he was coming in a national chairman.
“The Mimiko bloc believe in principle of keeping to laid down agreements. Sherrif was a hard sale from the beginning because of his reported links to Boko Haram and his kinship with Buhari, but we worked hard to convince people to accept him because he was just completing the tenure of the North East which was to expire in a few months,” the source revealed.
“It is unbelievable that all the things FFK [Femi Fani-Kayode] warned about Sheriff’s emergence has come to pass. The man is power hungry, he is a mole planted by Buhari to destroy PDP before 2018,” another source alleged.
The PDP faced a major leadership crisis following its election losses of 2015. The party chairman, Adamu Muazu was accused of secretly working against the reelection of former President Goodluck Jonathan and the PDP in favour of Muhammadu Buhari, his Fulani kinsman. The crisis led to his forced resignation and his deputy, Uche Secondus began to act as national chairman.
But, Ahmed Gulak, a former senior special assistant on political matters to President Jonathan insisted that he wanted to complete the party chairmanship tenure which was zoned to the North East zone. He went to court and obtained an order to remove Secondus and take over. A move which forced the party leadership to hurriedly fill the position of national chairman with Sherrif.
