By Promise Okongwu
The media has been abuzz since Tuesday, April 23, 2023, over the resignation of over 100 members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Imo State, with more expected to follow, according to sources close to the party. The mass resignation is in solidarity with their leader, Rt. Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, who cited the party’s refusal to reform as the reason for his exit.
One question on many minds is whether the PDP has refused to reform, given the reconstitution of its disciplinary, reconciliation, and constitution review committees during the last NEC meeting. However, political pundits and commentators predict that the real reasons for Ihedioha’s resignation have not been made public yet.
Below are the actual reasons why former Governor Emeka Ihedioha resigned from the PDP:
1. Ihedioha left the party due to the ongoing structural battle between him and Senator Sam Anyanwu, the National Secretary of the PDP, who hails from the same state.
2. Ihedioha resigned because the National Working Committee adopted the Awka-based High Court judgment that removed Hon. Charles Ugwu as the elected state chairman and validated Hon. Chidi Dike as the acting state chairman of the PDP in Imo State.
3. The Imo State PDP leadership crisis began during the 2023 governorship primaries, where Sam Daddy emerged as the party’s governorship candidate. This was after former Governor Emeka Ihedioha stepped down from contesting the PDP primaries, citing concerns that his co-contestant, who was also the National Secretary of the PDP, could not preside over the primary election in which both of them were contestants.
4. After the governorship primaries in Imo State and the subsequent emergence of Senator Anyanwu as the party’s candidate, Ihedioha insisted that the PDP constitution does not provide for dual nomination, and hence the Imo PDP flag bearer should resign from his National Secretary position in the party if he wanted his support.
5. Information gathered from close sources within the PDP hierarchy, including the Chairman of the PDP Governors’ Forum, Bala Mohammed, the Chairman of the PDP Board of Trustees, Senator Adolphus Nwabara, the Governor of Enugu State, Dr. Peter Mbah, and other leaders within the party, revealed that Anyanwu agreed to resign his position as soon as the elections were over, but failed to keep this promise.
6. Although Anyanwu’s promise to resign did not go down well with Ihedioha’s political camp, some close sources to the former Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives know that Sam Daddy would not keep the agreement and therefore opted to work against the party’s governorship candidate during the election.
7. According to sources from the PDP in the state, the leader of the anti-party group and the onslaught against Senator Nnaemeka’s gubernatorial ambition was the then Imo State PDP Chairman, Hon. Charles Ugwu.
8. As knowledgeable as I am in grassroots politics, one can testify that anti-party activities do not go down well with grassroots members of any political party. Therefore, a group of party executives led by Hon. Chidi Dike, who was the then Deputy Chairman of the party, instituted disciplinary actions against the then-State Chairman of the Imo State PDP, Charles Ugwu, and eventually expelled him from presiding over the affairs of the party in the state.
9. However, the NWC at that time, through a press release from the office of the National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, reversed the decision made by these embittered party members and returned Charles Ugwu as the State Chairman of the party in Imo State.
10. Loyalists of the National Secretary, led by Hon. Chidi Dike, went to the Anambra State High Court and obtained a judgment recognizing him as the authentic chairman of the PDP in Imo State. Reports have it that the leadership of the party at the national level obeyed the court by inviting him to a meeting with the NWC on Friday.
11. The invitation of Hon. Chidi Dike to the NWC did not go down well with Ihedioha and his loyalists, who viewed the decision of the party leadership as an insult and an affront to his political structure, and hence opted to leave the party for Senator Nnaemeka Anyanwu to continue his leadership strides.
Promise Okongwu is a writer and the Publicity Secretary of the PDP in Anambra State.
