POLITICS NIGERIA

Atiku, Amaechi, Others Reject Jonathan’s Ultimatum to Return to PDP

Nwaorgu Faustinus

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The possibility of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and dissenting Governors who defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) returning to the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as requested by President Goodluck Jonathan is zero, the spokesman of the defunct New Peoples Democratic Party (nPDP) has said. 

Addressing a PDP Grand Rally in Owerri, Imo State, last Saturday, President Jonathan had given Atiku and Governors Chibuike Amaechi (Rivers); Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso (Kano); Aliyu Wamakko (Sokoto); and Murtala Nyako (Adamawa) an ultimatum to return to PDP or lose their seniority in the party.  

“With due respect, President Jonathan is simply playing to the gallery. For the avoidance of doubt, Atiku, Amaechi and the other patriots who left the sinking and undemocratic PDP have no intention of returning to the party, either now or in the future. They are happy in APC, so Mr. President can keep his seniority as Atiku and the rest do not need it. Only a mad fellow will run away from a sinking ship and run back to such a ship,” immediate erstwhile National Publicity Secretary of defunct nPDP, Chief Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, said in a statement issued today in Port Harcourt.

Continuing, the statement said: “If we may ask, what seniority is President Jonathan talking about after having ensured that Atiku, a former Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, was never invited to any BoT and NEC meeting of PDP?  Which seniority is he to lose having since been denied all his rights as enshrined in the Constitution of PDP? What type of seniority would Amaechi, Kwankwaso, Nyako, Wamakko and others be seeking in a political party that did everything humanly possible to humiliate them, even taking the state PDP structures from them?”

According to Eze, “Having left PDP for good, Atiku, Amaechi and others are on a rescue mission to salvage our nation from the sorrowful state to which it has been subjected by the administration of President Jonathan. They should be allowed to concentrate on this divine mission and not be disturbed with calls that do not make any meaning.”

Lambasting the President over his Owerri visit, the statement said it is unfortunate that “despite the crisis in the country, President Jonathan is going about receiving expired politicians back into the PDP without commissioning any projects. It simply demonstrates that this administration is bereft of ideas and vision on how to save this country from its present comatose state.