-Party Denies Role in Opposition Party’s ‘Problems’
THE Peoples Democratic Party has no plans to sack members of its National Working Committee.
This was according to the party’s national publicity secretary, Mr. Olisa Metuh, who told journalists in Abuja on Wednesday that the National Working Committee has come to stay, with a constitutionally guaranteed tenure that is bound to end in 2015.
“I can assure you that this NWC has come to stay; this working committee will conduct elections; we will be in-charge of our party administration until our tenure ends in 2015.
“There is no attempt to remove anyone in the NWC. There is no problem, there are no crises,’’ he said.
The party spokesman also said that the part’s NEC lacked the power to remove any NWC member and added that there was no internal threat to warrant such unconstitutional move against the party’s leadership.
“What we read in the newspapers is that there appears to be clear war in the NWC. This is untrue.
“We have read all kinds of doomsday predictions in the papers and these are grossly exaggerated. We don’t know where they are coming from.
“But we know that they are calculated attempts to distract us from running the affairs of this party.
“I can assure you that after the Easter break, we shall hold our NEC meeting,’’ Metuh said.
Mr. Metuh stressed that the party was not embattled either with the NWC, Board of Trustees, caucus or with its state governors or any other political appointees.
He said that the issues which prevented the party from convening its NEC meeting as scheduled had been resolved with the recent election of its Board of Trustees chairman.
Metuh, however, blamed the inability of the party to convene its NEC meeting as prescribed in its constitution on the challenges of electing a new BoT chairman for the party.
He stressed that events in the PDP were being over-exaggerated by the opposition parties.
“We have differences in ideas and approach, but definitely we are united to drive the vision of our founding fathers,” Metuh said.
He said that there were no “Judases” among the top echelon of the party, within PDP governors or other members of the party.
He said the reconciliation tour embarked on by the National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, and BoT Chairman, Chief Tony Anenih, was to ensure that all PDP members were reconciled.
Metuh also denied media reports that the PDP was behind the registration problem that the All Progressive Congress (APC) was having with INEC.
He maintained that there was no presidential directive to the INEC on the issues as it was being speculated.
“We have been praying and watching to see the registration of APC as a political party, because we know they will disintegrate sooner than expected,’’ Metuh said.
This he said would be so because the APC did not have the capacity to manage crisis like the PDP.
He stressed that the PDP was not afraid of the APC that was still battling for registration.
Metuh said that rather than being afraid of the APC, the PDP would be glad if the APC met the constitutional requirements for registration