PDP Stalwarts In Blame Game Over Role Of Atiku, Wike In Party’s Crisis

The blame game over the current crisis rocking the Nigeria’s main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) took a dramatic turn yesterday as party’s chieftains clashed in Abuja.

In a bid to identify those responsible for the lingering crisis, the Leaders towed different paths blaming both the Party’s presidential candidate in the 2023 elections, Atiku Abubakar and the current Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Barrister Nyesom Wike for the worrying situation in the party.

Addressing participants at a conference on Tuesday in Abuja with the theme; “Fix PDP To Fix Nigeria”, a member of the House of Representatives, Hon Ikenga Ugochinyere, insisted that the FCT Minister and immediate past Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, should be held solely responsible for the impasse due to his obviously ‘controlling’ disposition.

However, sharply disagreeing Ugochinyere’s position, the PDP Deputy National Publicity Secretary, Ibrahim Abdullahi said the problem rest squarely on the shoulders of former Vice President Atiku who has continued to show disinterestedness in the party’s well-being.

In his intervention, Hon Ugochinyere fingered the Acting National Chairman, Ambassador Umar Damagum and Wike as the Party’s problem, saying; “When I was coming, I saw Fix PDP to Fix Nigeria. Very fantastic. But before you fix PDP you have to fix everything that is internal. And that starts with the issue of leadership struggle. We can’t wave it aside.

“And let me tell you, as long as we don’t resolve these issues, the people out there are just laughing at us. Like basic constitutional responsibility, Article 45 and 47, a tradition that we have maintained over the years. We find it difficult to speak the truth. What is Damagum still doing?

“And I ask you here now, as the national chairman of the party. So let’s leave Wike out of it. Wike has taken a job to run an errand for APC. So we already know where he belongs”.

For the ever-vocal lawmaker, the place to start from fixing the Party is to urgently address the leadership question and ensure the right thing is done rather than the present pursuit of selfish interest and agenda by certain individuals.

But Abdullahi sees things differently and calls out Nigeria’s former Vice President Atiku as the problem, maintaining that the National Working Committee (NWC) led by Damagum is not being tele-guided by FCT Minister Wike as alleged in some quarters.

Pointedly blaming Atiku for the Party’s woes, the PDP Deputy Spokesperson said; “We inherited the problems we are facing today. We are not in the pocket of Wike. Atiku Abubakar succeeded in foisting the worse government in the person of President Buhari on us.

“Atiku left the party with all the efforts many other people have put in and suddenly he surfaced again and got the ticket. We all rallied behind this same Atiku and we went to that election.

“There’s no way at the eve of that election where we had five governors threatening this party and Atiku Abubakar would demonstrate that kind of levity and carelessness to say that they can go to hell and it doesn’t matter

“Aided by an Ayu, who was clearly working for something different from what we were doing, the problem that this present NWC is contending with now Is a problem we inherited and Atiku cannot escape from sharing in the blame as a key actor.”

Forefront News recalls that arising from the conduct of the Presidential primary of the last election in which Barrister Wike lost to Atiku, the PDP has been engulfed in crisis.

Many political commentators and insiders have attributed the Party’s defeat by the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) at the 2023 presidential polls to the activities of the G-5 group led by Wike, as the the Governor of Rivers State.