As leadership crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Parry (PDP) lingers, Chairman, National Caretaker Committee, Senator Ahmed Makarfi, has hinted that Bayelsa State Governor, Seriake Dickson, has an evil agenda for the party, which is partly contributing to its inability to reconcile the aggrieved members.
Makarfi accused Dickson of dropping the proposal drafted at a meeting of the 11 PDP governors with former President Goodluck Jonathan and coming up with a personal one, which he submitted to Senator Ali Modu Sheriff’s group. He described this as a mischievous act that does not go well for the party.
Speaking at the secretariat of the Kaduna State Correspondents Chapel of Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Makarfi said: “Just a week before Governor Dickson submitted his report to Ali Modu Sheriff, the 11 PDP members, including himself, met with former President Goodluck Jonathan and came up with a unanimous proposal on the way out of the crisis in the party. Then, out of the 11 PDP governors, he (Dickson) pulled out and made a proposal, which he presented to Modu Sheriff. “Well, for us the issues in the PDP is not just about conducting convention; it is about more fundamental issues. How do you go for convention if you don’t address these fundamental issues and achieve reconciliation? You have not talked about the problems; you have not sorted them and you are more concerned about a committee to organise a convention; that means you will go and do convention while the crisis is still on.
“Governor Dickson was at the meeting of the governors and the former president, where they came up with a unanimous proposal; so, how can he pull out a week after and make his own proposal? If he had anything contrary to what they agreed on, why didn’t he suggest it at that meeting? He didn’t make sense, out of 11 governors, you pulled out and you made a separate proposal and presented to Modu Sheriff.
“The proposal by the former president and the 11 governors was presented to us, to the BOT chairman and to Modu Sheriff. If anything is going to change, they should go back to President Jonathan and the other governors to discuss and review the responses from us, from BOT, from Modu Sheriff and see if there is going to be any modification to the proposal, not for one single governor, under whatever name, who was a party to the unanimous proposal, to now come out with a personal proposal.
“But, he spoke with me informally and said he was bringing his proposal, which I never saw. He called the president and they were to meet on Wednesday; then he also called BOT chairman, who gave him appointment for Wednesday, only for him to go and submit his proposal to Modu Sheriff, to go ahead and conduct convention. And that is what Sheriff has been looking for. Now, he got somebody asking him to go ahead and conduct convention.
“So, what is Governor Dickson up to? I don’t know, but it is definitely an agenda not good for the PDP. His proposal is even a breach of the Court of Appeal judgment, because he is suggesting going for convention in June. The Court of Appeal said you cannot hold convention until August this year, based on the tenure it recognised.”
He said even the Sheriff group was not complying with the Court of Appeal judgment, as he (Sheriff) is still parading with party officials he single-handedly appointed after May 21, 2016, when the court ordered that the status quo before May 21 should be reverted to.
Makarfi, however, added that the way out of the PDP crisis was for all national officials to resign their positions, sign indemnity not to contest such position, then form a committee, consisting of members of his groups and Sheriff’s to organise a transparent convention, where there would be a level playing field for all the groups.
Source – The Sun
