The Ali Modu Sheriff camp of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has rejected the peace recipe offered by the party’s Board of Trustees (BoT) to stem the festering leader ship crisis in the party.
The BoT had on Monday directed the removal of the Rivers state Governor, Nyesom Wike as chairman of the convention planning committee and the immediate disbandment of the panel.
The trustees had similarly ordered that a repeat convention by held in Abuja, instead of Port Harcourt, favoured by the Wike and the Ahmed Makarfi led caretaker committee of the PDP.
A statement on Tuesday by Dr. Cairo Ojougbo on behalf of the Sheriff camp, said the resolutions of the BoT fell short of the decisions reached with another reconciliation committee headed by the Bayelsa state Governor, Henry Seriake Dickson.
The camp has insisted on having Sheriff chair the next National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting “where Makarfi will attend as a member of the BOT”.
“At the meeting, a chairman of the convention committee will be agreed upon, a new convention committee setup, including all other sub-committees like Zoning, Finance, Accreditation etc”, the statement added.
The faction demanded an enlarged meeting of stakeholders and members, where everybody will be given the right to air their views as prelude to genuine reconciliation.
The faction also rejected the vote of confidence passed on the caretaker committee by the BoT, on the ground that the committee had failed to organise a successful convention on two occasions.
The statement continued, “Consequently, we can now confidently inform the general public that well-meaning Nigerians have been urging Senator Makarfi to resign to save democracy.
“We therefore call on his friends and associates and family to advise him to do the needful and resign now to save multiparty democracy in Nigeria and stop impunity that has been the bane of internal democracy.
“That the BOT Chairman, Senator Walid Jubril, has brought crisis to the party. In any case his tenure has expired as he has spent more than 10 years as Secretary and Chairman of BOT which runs contrary to the party constitution.
“A party where we have imminently qualified persons like Senator David Mark, Babangida Aliyu and others cannot be led by unstable individuals controlled by the love for money.
“That the source of irritation in the party is the still-born illegal caretaker committee and the Board of Trustees should have advised that the illegality be addressed”.
The Sheriff camp also demanded the immediate reconstitution of the BoT, stressing that “until we get it right and check impunity, the Nigerian opposition party won’t perform as required”.
“As we move towards reconciliation, PDP should prevent any person or group from hijacking the party. Be rest assured that the PDP will emerge stronger as we note that impunity marred the party’s success in the 2015 general elections,” the statement added.
