Pressure is mounting on Dr. Iyorchia Ayu to resign as National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Ayu was elected PDP party leader in October last year but assumed office in December, because the tenure of the former National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, subsisted till December that same year.
The national chairman is accused of sundry offences, including his style of leadership, which a party source said, has alienated members of the National Working Committee (NWC). Ayu is also accused of highhandedness.
“The point is that he is running a one-man show. He is not carrying the NWC members along. Most NWC members are complaining that they have been side-lined by the National Chairman,” a high ranking member of the party volunteered. The National Chairman was reported of always boasting to the NWC members that he is one of the three only surviving founding fathers of the PDP.
According to the source, Ayu used to tell them that he, former Jigawa State governor Alhaji Sule Lamido, and Prof. Jerry Gana, are the only PDP founding fathers still alive. PDP members are also not happy with the performance of the party in last Saturday’s Ekiti governorship election.
The party’s candidate Bisi Kolawole came a distant third in the election, with less than 19 percent of the votes cast, after the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate Biodun Oyibanji and Social Democratic Party (SDP) Segun Oni. PDP did not visit Ekiti to campaign for its candidate even though a National Campaign Committee headed by Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde, was set up.
“The committee was not inaugurated and no money was made available for our party in Ekiti to campaign. “The APC gave their candidate moral and financial support. (Bola) Tinubu was in Ekiti on Monday.
The day PDP promised to go to Ekiti for campaign was on Thursday, that was the day (Governor Ifeanyi) Okowa was named as Atiku’s running mate. Nobody went to Ekiti to campaign. “If care is not taken, we are going to lose Osun next month.
The Chairman is behaving as if his only concern is to win the presidential election,” the source stated. The National Chairman was accused of trading off the Ekiti governorship poll.
And in a related development, yesterday former Minister of Niger Delta Affairs Elder Godsday Orubebe resigned his membership of the PDP. Orubebe accused the National Chairman of disregarding the provisions of the party’s constitution; especially in throwing open the contest for the presidential ticket.
According to him, the emergence of a Northerner as the party’s presidential flag bearer has provided a situation where the two topmost positions in the party, the National Chairman and the presidential candidate, are “occupied by Northerners, contrary to section 7.3(c) of the party’s constitution.”
Before his election in October last year, Ayu was said to have agreed to step down as National Chairman if a Northerner emerged as the presidential candidate of the party. (New Telegraph)
