Buhari’s Former Minister, Alhassan Defects To PDP

BY AMEH IDUJAGI, JALINGO – President Muhammadu Buhari’s former Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Senator Aisha Alhassan has announced her defection to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Alhassan was the gubernatorial flagbearer of United Democratic Party (UDP) in the 2019 elections, a Party she joined after being denied the opportunity of seeking the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship ticket .

She told Journalists on Sunday after a stakeholders meeting in Jalingo that majority of her supporters across all political parties and from the 168 wards of Taraba have encouraged her to shift her base to the PDP.

Alhassan said the stakeholders meeting, which lasted up till midnight on Saturday, drew participants from all those who contested for various political offices on the UDP’s platform inas well as the Executive members of the party from the ward to state levels and other respected elders.

She further said that more than 80 per cent of respondents in an opinion poll conducted by a committee headed by Alhaji Abdulmumini Vaki, a former PDP chairman in the state, which covered the 16 LGAs of the state agreed that she should move to the PDP. 

She added that based on the outcome of the opinion poll, she has no option than to go by the decision of majority members of the UDP.

Alhassan further said; “I cannot go against the decision of the popular opinions of my supporters. I am glad that the committee did not suggest the APC as an option.”

A communiqué issued at the end of the stakeholders meeting, in Jalingo on Saturday night, recommended that two committees be set up immediately to fast track the defecting process.

The communiqué which was signed by the state UDP Chairman, Alhaji Hassan Chul, said the first committee is to visit the national leadership of the UDP in Abuja to express the appreciation of supporters of the former minister for providing her the platform to run for the 2019 governorship election, while the second committee is to arrange a meeting with PDP leadership in Taraba to work out modalities for the former minister’s official return to the PDP.

Alhassan contested and won the election for the senatorial seat of Taraba North in 2011 on the platform of the PDP before she defected to the APC where she contested for the governorship in 2015.