The National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Ahmed Adamu Mu’azu, Wednesday appealed to the Jigawa State Governor, Sule Lamido, to help the party woo back the five governors of the party who defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) last November.
Five governors – Chibuike Amaechi of Rivers State, Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State, Musa Rabiu Kwankwanso of Kano State, Aliyu Wammako of Sokoto State and Ahmed Abdulfatah of Kwara State – defected to APC due to some irreconcilable differences they had with the presidency and National Working Committee (NWC) of PDP under the former national chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur.
Speaking when Lamido visited him following his emergence as the chairman of PDP, Mu’azu said: “Please talk to the G5 governors on our behalf to come back to the party. Appeal to them on their sense of patriotism and nationalism to come back to the PDP. PDP is not a tribalised party.
“We are a big family and when there is any rancour which is inevitable because of the size of the party, we sit down as a family and resolve it.”
According to Mu’azu, who was responding to Lamido's comments when the PDP chairman disclosed that a powerful committee would soon be set up to ensure that the defected governors are brought back to the party, “Whatever injustice done to them, we are bold enough to say sorry to them.”
Mu’azu, who said nobody would build a house and leave it to another person’s house, urged Lamido to appeal to the sense of patriotism of the defected governors and urged the Jigawa governor to ask them to reflect on what PDP as a political party had done in their political lives by coming back, saying, “Our doors are open.”
In a bid to assure Lamido and the defected governors that the PDP meant business, Mu’azu referred to the suspended National Vice-Chairman of the North-west zone, Ibrahim Kazaure, who was suspended by the Umaru Dikko-led National Disciplinary Committee, as the authentic national vice-chairman of the party.
The statement by Mu’azu made the entire members of the PDP NWC and the Jigawa State delegation to burst into jubilation and may have brought the continued existence of the Umaru Dikko Disciplinary Committee into doubt, as the National Executive Committee (NEC) is yet to ratify the appointment and establishment of the disciplinary committee.
Mu’azu also called on Lamido not to turn his back on the party, stressing that PDP needed his experience at this moment. Mu'azu said as part of the party’s reconciliation efforts, the PDP would visit the five governors that had defected to the APC.
Earlier, the Jigawa State Governor traced the history of PDP, of which he was a founding member, stating that it would have been unconceivable for him to leave a party he co-founded and nursed to fruition.
He said the idea of PDP was aimed at addressing the injustices of June 12, 1993 presidential election, explaining that was why both the PDP, the defunct All Peoples Party (APP) and the Alliance for Democracy (AD) deliberately ensured that their presidential candidates like the PDP emerged from the South-west zone in the 1999 election.
Lamido said the idea of PDP was to ensure the unity of Nigeria because of the events and circumstances of the military administrations of the late General Ibrahim Babangida and General Sani Abacha that nearly threatened the unity of Nigeria.
He said: “I have nothing against my elder brother, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, but when things go wrong, we have a duty to correct it. PDP is the only party that has the unity of Nigeria at the back of its ideology and therefore we cannot toy with the unity of Nigeria.
“Before the arrival of PDP, the ship of Nigeria was heading for the lighthouse. PDP must get it right, if PDP can’t get it right, then there is a problem for this country. If the process is wrong, then we are in a big trouble in Nigeria,” adding, however, that Mu’azu had a very tough job ahead of him.
Turning to the members of the PDP NWC, Lamido told them to be courageous as they had supported all the actions of Tukur when the governors and stakeholders were gradually being sacked or suspended.
He said: “When I see that my brothers are gradually leaving the party for another party, I get worried. You have to be courageous at all times.”
He pledged his loyalty to the party, promising that he would not jump ship from the house he helped build.
Source: Thisday
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