PDP Crisis: Governors In Reconciliatory Mood!
…Pledge to honour Supreme Court ruling
It may soon be the dawn of a new day for the embattled Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as elected Governors on the Party’s platform are heartily playing reconciliation tunes ahead of the Supreme Court judgment on the crises bedeviling Nigeria’s immediate past ruling party.
The Governors, hitherto celebrated by the party’s internal organs as the proverbial ‘hen that lays the golden eggs’, are already making a clear U-turn from their uncompromising stand not to recognise Senator Ali Modu Sheriff as the PDP National Chairman.
A statement by the PDP’s Governors’ Forum in Abuja on Friday and signed by Chinwe Nnorom of its Publicity Division, said the party is beyond and bigger than every one and all members must therefore defer to its supremacy at all times.
Insisting that PDP would emerge from the crisis a more united, solid and stronger entity, the Forum expressed its resolve to address all divisive tendencies within the party and ensure its return to winning ways in all elective contests leading to the 2019 general elections.
But the Governors, who are loyalists of the Senator Ahmed Makarfi-led faction, and some party stakeholders are now sober and have promised to embrace a “no winner and no vanquished” when the appeal is finally determined by the highest court in the land.
Rising from a meeting at the residence of the Chairman of the Forum and Governor of Ekiti State, Chief Ayodele Fayose, the PDP Governors resolved “to remain confident, committed and loyal to the PDP believing that the Party which is more democratic than any other in the Country, will be united towards winning elections at all levels in 2019”.
The statement also said that in re-assuring PDP faithful and supporters nationwide, the Forum Chairman, called for unity and continuous agreement among all segments of the party to close ranks and work towards the PDP’s overall success and the nation’s democracy experience.
At the meeting were Governors of Akwa Ibom – Udom Emmanuel; Delta – Ifeanyi Okowa; Bayelsa State – Henry Seriake Dickson; Gombe – Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo; Deputy Governor of Rivers – Ipalibo Banigo; and host governor, Ayo Fayose of Ekiti.
Among prominent party leaders and stalwarts that grace the meeting are Prof. Jerry Gana, former governors of Abia state -Senator T. A. Orji; and Imo state – Chief Achike Udenwa; as well as ex-Ministers of Women Affairs, Hajiya Zainab Maina; and Hajiya Inna Ciroma.
In the last two years, the PDP has been embroiled in a bitter leadership struggle that has factionalized it along two combative groups led former Governors of Borno and Kaduna States, Senator Ali Sheriff and Senator Makarfi. However, the apex court judgment is expected to settle the raging crisis that has seen the Party losing series of elections in distressing circumstances across the country.
