The Senate Minority Leader, Senator Comrade Abba Patrick Moro, PDP, Benue South, has given insight why the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory Administration, FCTA, Nyesom Wike was allowed to attend the National Caucus meeting of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, preparatory to last week’s National Executive Committee, meeting of the party.
According to Moro, there was no way Wike would have been stopped from attending the meeting since he has not been found guilty of any crime and penalized by the party.
The minority leader said that if the party’s disciplinary committee, headed by former President of the Senate, Senator Bukola Saraki, found Wike guilty of the alleged antiparty activities and had him, he would stop attending the party’s meetings.
Moro said the survival of Amb. Umar Lliya Damagum as Acting National Chairman of PDP was not a victory or defeat for anybody but a decision that was unanimously agreed on by the relevant stakeholders for the party to forge ahead.
Senator Moro’s reaction was against the backdrop of rumours in some quarters that Amb. Damagum’s survival, against call for his resignation, was victory for the former governor of River State, Nyesom Wike, and a defeat for PDP Presidential candidate in the 2023 general elections, Atiku Abubakar.
In a statement on Sunday by his media adviser, Emmanuel Eche’Ofun John, Senator Moro said the activities and in-activities of the PDP should not be translated to Atiku and Wike.
He said the whole issue was not about victory or defeat for anybody but about PDP; about providing an alternative formidable platform for Nigerians to look up to.
Moro said, “We cannot translate the entirety of PDP’s activities and in-activities to Wike and Atiku, out of millions of other members of the party across the country who also have their own thinking and reasons for being in the party.
“The whole issue was not about Wike or Atiku, or victory for Wike or defeat for Atiku, the issue was existential.
“We came together and reasoned together, that, in the present scenario where Nigerians are hurting due to the maladministration of the APC government, what do we do to provide an alternative platform for Nigerians to look up to? In that circumstances, we decided to thread with caution so that we wouldnt throw away the baby with the bath water,” he said.
On why the National Caucus of the party allowed Nyesom Wike into their meeting, the Minority Leader said, “The constitution of our party is very clear on who is a member and who is not a member of the caucus of the party, and I dare say, at this point, that as a former governor who is still a member of the party, Nyesom Wike is a member of the National Caucus of the party.
“If actions had been taken immediately after the elections and people who are perceived to have acted contrary to the desires and yearnings of the PDP have been sanctioned, then we can say that having been expelled or suspended, you can’t be here, but as it is, none of such actions have been taken, so you can’t just ban people from attending meetings.
“One of the fallouts of the last NEC meeting was the resuscitation of the Reconciliation and Disciplinary Committee, which is saddled with the responsibility of identifying the area of antiparty and the dramatis personae involved in the activities, and recommending appropriate punitive measures against those who have been found guilty to serve as a deterrent to future occurrences.
“Unfortunately, that hasn’t been done, and so to that extent, as a voluntary organization, if the members involved insist they are still members of the party, until actions are taken by the Reconciliation and Disciplinary Committee, we want to assume that they are still members of the party.”
On expectations from the next NEC meeting scheduled for August 15, as it concerns the position of the National Chairman of the party, Moro, who noted that the party’s constitution had a well-spelled-out succession plan, said, “The constitution of our party has a well-spelled-out succession plan. Section 35 (3C) states that where a vacancy exists, someone from the zone of the immediate past occupier of the office shall be appointed by NEC to complete the tenure of the person who vacated the office.
“For the position of the National Chairman, we will look at the succession plan of the party, in accordance with the constitutional provisions, and produce a replacement for Senator Iyorchia Ayu from North Central now that he has heeded to our plea and withdrawn his case from the court. We will go to the next NEC meeting with open minds and invoke the relevant sections of the constitution to produce his replacement.”
Senator Moro, who appealed to members and stakeholders of the party to have some level of circumspection and restraint in their actions and utterances so as not to further polarize the party, assured that everything humanly possible would be done to put the party on its winning ways, to rescue Nigerians from the grinding poverty and sufferings that the ruling APC has plunged them into.
