Nwodo: ‘Atiku Too Dey Laugh O’
Defeated presidential aspirant on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, seems to be having the last laugh against his perceived traducer, the former National Chairman of PDP, Dr. Okwesilieze Nwodo, who was sacked yesterday.
Atiku, who was very bitter after he lost the PDP presidential ticket to President Goodluck Jonathan, blamed Nwodo for frustrating his attempts meet him to discuss issues that bordered on free and fair presidential primary that took place during the party’s national convention last Thursday in Abuja, Nigeria’s Federal Capital.
Atiku also accused Nwodo of delivering the convention to President Jonathan.
A statement by Atiku’s Campaign Organisation said the former Vice President could not have been responsible for Nwodo’s downfall when he (Atiku) himself was a direct victim of the former Chairman’s insincerity, double standard, opportunism, selfishness and mischief.
“The erstwhile chairman delivered the convention to the President but they still went on baying for his blood. That tells you there was more to it than the eye could see. Someone wants blood and you give him palm oil. Does that satisfy him?†the statement contended.
Atiku recalled that a few weeks to the PDP Convention, the former PDP Chairman did everything to frustrate his presidential ambition by making impossible a meeting intended to discuss the modalities of how the January 15, 2011 convention was to hold.
He alleged that Nwodo did not agree to meet or even answer phone calls for upwards of two months now.
According to Atiku, Nwodo frustrated every meeting his campaign organization had requested to discuss serious issues that border on free and fair election, especially the need to create a level-playing ground in which no delegate would feel constrained or intimidated to choose their preferred candidate.
The statement noted that the former national chairman of the PDP had crises across the country in many chapters of the party, including Enugu State, where he and Governor Sullivan Chime were engaged in a bitter battle of supremacy.
“It is clear that the former chairman had enough home troubles to contend with,†Atiku further maintained.
As for the issue of Atiku’s return to the party and subsequent waiver granted him to run for the party’s ticket, the Campaign Organization said the then Chairman and the National Working Committee of PDP were confronted with a fait accomplish since the former Vice President was among those re-integrated by the Dr. Alex Ekwueme Committee set up to reconcile the party.
In this regard, the former Vice President distanced himself from any suggestions that his presidential bid was responsible for the unceremonious exit of Nwodo.
The National Executive Committee, NEC, of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, forced Nwodo to resign yesterday. The party cited the multiple litigations hanging on Nwodo’s neck as reason for his sack. The quest for his successor has begun.
Sources said another reason he was asked to quit was because the Igbo leaders of the party in the South-East zone no longer have confidence in him.
P.M.NEWS also gathered that Nwodo was asked by President Goodluck Jonathan to resign on Monday after both of them met in Aso Rock.
Yesterday’s emergency NEC meeting at the party’s headquarters in Abuja was summoned specifically to decide the fate of Nwodo and who will succeed him.
Nwodo was said to have boxed himself into a tight corner when he attempted to preside over the party’s National Convention last Thursday in Abuja even though a High Court in Enugu had restrained him from parading himself as the party’s National Chairman.
The court order was issued on the eve of the party’s convention during which President Jonathan was elected as the party’s presidential flag bearer in the April general elections.
Nwodo is being accused of breaching two sections of the party’s constitution, one of which was his attempt to preside over the party’s convention even when he knew that he had been barred by a court from doing so.
Nwodo had also been at loggerheads with his state governor, Sullivan Chime of Enugu State. Apart from the struggle to control the party’s machinery in the state, the two party stalwarts have been at war over the party’s primaries in the state. Nwodo had insisted that he would nominate the candidates, while Governor Chime said he was in charge.
The crisis in the party took a turn for the worse on Sunday when the South-East chapter of PDP, comprising five governors, ministers, lawmakers and other stakeholders in the zone passed a vote of no confidence on Nwodo in Enugu after their meeting to resolve the crisis plaguing the party in the zone.
During his short-lived tenure, Nwodo introduced reforms in the party by reducing the powers of the governors. He made the state chairmen of the party the de facto leaders of the party in the states. This did not go down well with the governors who did everything to maintain their control over the party.
His decision to reduce the powers of the governors in party matters led to crisis in the state chapters of PDP.
Parallel executives emerged in the state chapters of the party and this resulted in bickering which often resulted in bloody clashes. Many lives were lost and property worth millions of naira were destroyed during these clashes, some of which were fallouts of the party’s primaries.
— Oluokun Ayorinde/Abuja
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