The latest crisis in the party was sparked after the Senator Anyim Pius Anyim-led Presidential Committee on the crises in the PDP submitted a report Monday night recommending the resignation of Tukur and all members of the NWC. The recommendation was based on fallouts from the report of the INEC on the PDP National Convention of March 2012 which was faulted by the electoral umpire as irregular. The INEC report had alleged that eight of the NWC officers were improperly elected. Upon the INEC report, some members of the party had gone to court to seek dismissal of the affected officers from office.
The Anyim committee, it was learnt, had recommended that members of the NWC step down not only to avert possible negative political consequences of allowing them to conduct a future presidential convention that could be legally defective. But yesterday, Tukur was defiant as he affirmed his determination to weather the storm after leading members of the NWC to a meeting with the President.
Tukur stated that “It is not true that I am resigning. Resign for what? It is not true at all. We are here to run the PDP and we have done so and we will continue to run the PDP. We are going to have our caucus tonight, we are going to have BoT tomorrow (today); we are going to have our NEC on Thursday.
“It is not true, Chairman is there dam dam. The chairman is not only in office, he is in power. In PDP, there is no vacancy in the national chairmanship. The meeting is about regularising the family of PDP because there was an INEC observation, some of the members of the NWC were not properly elected so it has to be regularized.
“Those who have not been elected will resign and they will go back, they will have opportunity to regularize. About eight people are affected. There are three people that are not affected; they, the National Chairman, the National Financial Secretary, National Auditor and of course National Secretary which is vacant now.
“The other eight people- all the deputies, and ex-officios and the rest of them whose elections in the convention were considered irregular, by INEC, would resign,”
It was learnt, yesterday, that plans were already on the way to nominate Professor Jerry Gana to lead a caretaker committee that will oversee affairs of the party pending the coming of a new set of NWC officials.
A source also revealed that Senator Stella Omu from South-South would also serve as a member of the Committee with other members drawn from the BoT to represent the geo-political zones of the country.
It was allege the Secretary of BoT, Senator Walid Jibrin and the Political Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan, Alhaji Ahmed Gulak were last night locked in a meeting at Legacy House, Maitama drawing the final list of the caretaker committee preparatory to presenting them before the BoT today. And also that the Gana-led Committee would oversee party affairs pending when zonal and mini congresses are held in July for the purpose of electing a new NWC.
However, Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ekweremadu who led the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Emeka Ihedioha, Deputy Leader of the Senate, Abdul Ningi and the Deputy House Leader, Hon Leo Ogor told State House correspondents that the meeting was part of consultations with the President on how to resolve the crises in the party. Ekweremadu was hopeful that despite the crises in the party, it will come out stronger.
“It is a routine consultation between the President and the leadership of the National Assembly. But this one has to do with our party’s issues because we are of the same political party. It is essentially a party affair,” he said.
On media reports that the chairman and some members of the National Executive Committee would resign, Ekweremadu said “we are still consulting. In the evening (yesterday) we are going to have a national caucus of the party to look at all the options available to the party.
This is a party of consultation so that by tomorrow (today) or later this evening we will have a position of the PDP on these issues,” he said.
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