UMARU DIKKO HEADS PDP DISCIPLINARY COMMITTEE

The Peoples Democratic Party has announced the composition of its national disciplinary committee with loyalists of President Goodluck Jonathan dominating the panel.
The party’s acting National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Tony Okeke, announced the composition of the committee on Monday.
Okeke, in a statement, said the naming of the committee was in line with “the provisions of Articles 57 (1), (2), (3) of the party’s constitution.”
The committee members include a former Minister of Transport, Dr. Umaru Dikko (Chairman); Amalete Turner (Deputy Chairman); publisher of the Champion Newspapers Limited, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu; Alhaji Shuaibu Oyedokun; Hajiya Nana Kadiri; Mr. Hussaini Diraki, and Senator Emmanuel Agboti (Secretary).
Okeke said the party’s National Chairman, Dr. Bamanga Tukur, would inaugurate the committee later.
Findings by our correspondent, however, showed that the majority of the committee members were loyalists and second- term campaigners for Jonathan.
For example, Turner described as ‘Jonathan’s Man Friday,’ hails from Bayelsa State like the President. He is a strong confidant of the President, who reportedly insisted that former Governor Timipriye Sylva of Bayelsa State would not return to office.
Iwuanyanwu and Oyedodun have also not hidden their support for the President.
Oyedokun, a former PDP Deputy Chairman in the South-West, defected to the Action Congress of Nigeria alongside a former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar.
A former governor of Osun State, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, facilitated Oyedokun’s return to the PDP.
Oyinlola, also a former PDP National Secretary, reportedly took Oyedokun to former President Olusegun Obasanjo to enable him to return to the PDP.
However, Oyedokun, in a recent interview with journalists, described Obasanjo as an embarrassment to the PDP.
Oyedokun had said, “Obasanjo should stop playing God. God has done so much for him than any other person – in terms of governance in this country. Nebuchadnezzar, in the Bible, did it and failed. The ancient Pharaohs did it and failed.
“Obasanjo is oppressing us and God is always with the oppressed.
“Anybody who has benefitted from the PDP and is attempting to damage the party, God will damage the person.”
Meanwhile, reacting to the setting up of the committee, the Chief of Staff to the Rivers State Government, Mr. Tony Okocha, said Tukur should have consulted widely before picking members of the panel.
Okocha, who spoke in a telephone interview with The PUNCH, explained that the PDP should have asked questions and carried people along in its quest to constitute the committee.
Source: Punch