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• Says Damagum’s weakness escalated party’s crisis
From Aidoghie Paulinus, Abuja
The factional Zonal Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), South South, George Turnah, has narrated how some present and former governors of the party shared the National Working Committee (NWC) slots to their preferred candidates, preparatory to the party’s convention in Ibadan.
He further said the governors carried out the sharing formula with the weakness or compromise of the Umar Damagum-led National Working Committee, whom he alleged, messed up the entire process.
He also spoke on sundry other issues.
There’s still wrangling in the PDP. What’s going on?
First, let me say that the PDP remains very strong, vibrant and solid. Of course, you can see the interest. And if the PDP was not alive or if the PDP as it is today is not a strong, viable platform, there won’t be all of these struggles and scrambles and all the things you see. They are normal. What is happening in the PDP is politics. Politics is playing out because we are in that season when we are naturally expected to transit – transition in leadership from the NWC whose tenure is going to elapse. Normally, we would have had a convention to birth a new set of leadership at the national level. Now, it is the scramble for control. Don’t forget that politics in itself is a conspiracy for power and control of scarce resources to apply it for the benefit of the common man. So, the welfare and the wellbeing of the masses are the core of politics. But in arriving at that political power that gives you access to scarce resources and the control and application of the scarce resources, there is a battle because once it involves scrambling, election is all about hustle, scrambling for positions. That is what is happening in the party.
There are two critical factors that have led to the conflicts in the magnitude we have seen it. First is that in every context, there is the place of an umpire because context is made up of gladiators, people scrambling for control of power. But there must be a referee which is the umpire. In this case, the umpire is the national working committee. Normally, the umpire is expected to be unbiased and non partisan. The umpire must be able to keep an open mind and provide a platform that is devoid of interest for the gladiators. But sadly, in our situation in the build up to our elective convention, we had a working committee as an umpire who themselves became interested parties. So, when you have that kind of situation in your hands, it is already a crisis situation. Just imagine that INEC as an umpire that should conduct election to the office of the president of Nigeria, becomes an interested party and within the INEC, there are some commissioners, the INEC chairman, INEC secretary, positioned to contest for the president of Nigeria; contest for Senate president, contest for speaker and remaining in INEC, you will definitely know that it is a crisis situation because once you lose that impartiality, it is a crisis situation. So, the NWC led by Damagum, became an interested party rather than playing the role of an umpire. And you can see the outcome of the gathering they had in Ibadan. Ambassador Taofeek Arapaja was Deputy National Chairman, South; today, they are saying he was elected National Secretary. Daniel Woyegikuro was National Financial Secretary; today they are saying he is now the Deputy National Chairman, South. So, you can go on and on. If you knew you were going to contest election to return to the National Working Committee, why didn’t you resign so that you take yourself away from the umpire and become an interested party, to become an aspirant, one of the contenders? But you chose to remain in the working committee as an umpire and then, carried on with undemocratic practices, messed up our constitution, messed up the Electoral Act and then, carried on with a grand design to install yourself back in the next leadership. And of course, maybe with the backing of governors, but people fail to understand that before now, the Governors’ Forum, yes, a very strong group within the party, once the Governors’ Forum meet and says this is the direction, unity list, everybody agrees and it goes. But today, the case is different. You have the Governors’ Forum and you also have other strong leaders of the party who have also emerged as alternate force to the Governors’ Forum. Assuming you have a strong National Assembly caucus of the party and the National Assembly caucus says no, we have our list of those we want to contest as national chairman, national secretary and the Governors’ Forum also says no, we have our list of national chairman, national secretary and all that and maybe you also have the forum of state chairmen as a block and they also come up with their list and says no, no, no, governors, we don’t agree; National Assembly, we don’t agree, we have our list of preferred aspirants of choice, then you have various interest groups contending.
What normally happens is that the umpire enables a system where everybody has access to nomination form. You buy your nomination form, you go and campaign to delegates and then we meet at the convention venue and the delegates decide. But in this case, the NWC that is supposed to be the umpire just aligned with one group, the Governors’ Forum. And then, because of the fear of the other alternate force that has emerged, they decided to travel in illegality. For instance, this party has a federal minister. Not just any minister, but minister of the FCT. By the statutory definition of that office, the occupier of that office has a status of a governor of a state. In some other societies, that office is mayoral in nature and it is even contested for. Elsewhere, you hear of Mayor of New York, Mayor of Egypt, and all that. So, when you have a minister of the FCT in the PDP, he is never a-push-aside. He is an alternate power to the Governors’ Forum. But what has happened is that the Governors’ Forum and the governors of our party are so much afraid of this alternate power that has emerged, Minister Nyesom Wike, that they are not able to confront him. Where is the venue to confront Minister Nyesom Wike? The convention ground! The battle field is the convention ground. Minister Nyesom Wike is entitled to his own political interest because politics is played along interest line. Nyesom Wike is also entitled to political alliances within the party of those whose interest aligns with his interest. Everybody has that liberty – I have, every member of this party has. My interest aligns with that of Minister Nyesom Wike, therefore, I am in Minister Nyesom Wike’s political camp. And it is normal. So, why don’t the NWC and the Governors’ Forum allow a free, transparent, credible process in the move to enthrone the next set of national leaders of this party? What do you need to do? Bring out the guidelines, make them open, everybody goes to the party secretariat, pick nomination forms, all aspirants, go around the country and canvass for votes. When it gets to the day of convention and election, the Governors’ Forum should deploy their strategy and market their candidates. If you win, you take. Minister Nyesom Wike and his team will map out their strategy, deploy whatever tactics they want to deploy, if they win, they take. At the end of the day, after that election, we all come back together as a party and support whichever leadership that emerges because the process is transparent. Imagine a situation where as a journalist, I have thrown this challenge before, I said any journalist that can come out to give a report of any aspirant that visited Wadata Plaza to pick nomination form or even return the nomination form after picking the form, you fill, you came to submit and that it is known to journalists that so so aspirant was at the Wadata Plaza to pick nomination form and he also returned it; any journalist that can give us successfully any of such report, I will reward the person. Nobody, no journalist can. And you know that normally during election, whether national party office election or general election, when we go to our national secretariat to pick form, it is with fanfare. We go with Ogene, Agaba, and masquerade with joy. The environment is charged and even the party staff are happy because you go there, you drop one naira, you drop two naira, everybody is happy, you take pictures, you pick your nomination form and you go. The day you are coming to return the form, it is the same thing. Before election, our aspirants go round the country to canvass for votes. They consult with delegates at the state chapters, but nothing of such happened. Journalists, electronic, print and other media platforms, will periodically analyse the chances of each aspirant before our convention. None of such happened because you don’t even know who the aspirant is. These gentlemen just printed one, one form. They printed form for national secretary and gave to Arapaja; printed form for deputy national chairman, south, and the governors shared among themselves. So, the one for Arapaja was Seyi Makinde. He took that one for himself and gave to Arapaja. The one for deputy national chairman, south, was for Governor Duoye Diri. He took that one and gave to Daniel Woyegikuro, the incumbent financial secretary. Governor of Enugu State, Mbah, took his own and gave to one woman there, the women leader. And Governor Bala took his own. So, this was how the governors, with the weakness or compromise rather of the Damagum-led National Working Committee, messed up the entire thing. Nobody will accept that kind of thing except you are not a true member of this party. Nobody, no leader who genuinely wants the growth and betterment of the party will accept that kind of nonsense, especially when you have alternate political force or forces as they were. So, Minister Nyesom Wike will just sit down in a party, you have shared all the forms amongst you as governors, including the region where he comes from, haba?
What does the constitution say about NWC members contesting for those positions? Don’t they have right to contest for those offices?
Why did we have a long battle for Anyanwu as National Secretary? These same guys said Anyanwu went to contest for governor.
Who are the guys you are referring to?
The NWC, Damagum and co and all the governors and all of them. They said Anyanwu went to contest the governorship of Imo State. Anyanwu did not resign as National Secretary. He was screened by the PDP screening committee. He contested primary, he won and they gave him ticket. He didn’t resign. He went for the election and it wasn’t successful. He came back, continued his duties, no problem; conducted congresses, signed off ward congress, local government congress, states, across the country. And when they came up with their design of wanting to hijack the party, that was when they remembered that Anyanwu ought to have resigned before going to contest and having gone to contest the governorship election, he was deemed to have resigned and they just took Udeh-Okoye and pronounced him national secretary. That was the beginning of our crisis. Now, the same you, the same thing that you used in creating crisis for us until the Supreme Court had to intervene to resolve the matter and Anyanwu settled in back as national secretary, the same you sat as NWC member, conducted election for yourself and returned yourself.
But don’t they have a right to contest the election?
They have. The constitution gives them the right to contest, to seek second term. Assuming they even wanted a second term for the office they were occupying, the constitution gives them that privilege. If you want to contest for some other offices, the constitution gives you that privilege. And the constitution does not make it mandatory that you must resign. It says ‘may resign.’ That was why Anyanwu didn’t resign. But on moral ground, if it becomes an issue for you that Anyanwu ought to have resigned and you created so much trouble by bringing Udeh-Okoye, why did you not resign when this case is even worse because you are conducting an election within the party? The one Anyanwu went for was conducted by INEC, an external power. This one that you are contesting to become national secretary, to become national this, was conducted by you, the NWC. But you sat down there, designed the scheme, worked out the scheme of power and you returned yourself against the interest and rights of other party members.
