Tag: PDP

Nigeria: Secondus, Former NPN Youth Leader to Lead PDP to 2019 Elections

Post author By Kings UBA
Post date December 10, 2017

Uche Secondus is elected PDP Chairman

Nigeria: Secondus, Former NPN Youth Leader to Lead PDP to 2019 Elections

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) National Convention which held Saturday in Abuja Nigeria has produced Uche Secondus, as the National Chairman of the party.

Much expectations go with the winner of the election. He will work to unite the balkanized form of the party, get the Nigerian electorate to re-admit the PDP and also lead the party to the 2019 general elections.

Secondus will have a tough time uniting different big political interests in the party. And how he will ride the tide will determine the fate of the party in the coming years.

The Rivers State born politician is not new in the block. He made his foray into politics during the Second Republic in 1978 when he served as Rivers State Youth Leader of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) He also became the Rivers State Publicity Secretary of the National Republican Convention (NRC) (1993 – 1998) and a two-term Chairman of the Rivers State People’s Democratic Party.

In 2007, Secondus was the South-South Coordinator for the PDP National Campaign Council that organized the campaigns for the party during that year’s general elections. In 2008, at the People’s Democratic Party Convention, he gained further promotion to National Organizing Secretary, holding office until 2012. Secondus is the pioneer Chairman of the Governing Board of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC). On 1 September 2013, he was elected Deputy National Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party.[4][5] He also briefly served as acting National Chairman of the party, following the resignation of Adamu Mu’azu in 2015.

One factor that worked for Secondus in todays convention is that leaders of the party wanted a grass-root politician to lead the party and Secondus is adjudged one.

Permutations are that he would be able to take the PDP back to the people.

Secondus told delegates that his mission was to rebuild, to reposition and to regain the lost ground come 2019 general election. He said that he would be committed with passion to make sure that our party within the next few months is quickly repositioned and be ready for elections.

“I will focus on only one agenda which is to rebuild, to reposition and at the same time to regain the lost ground.

“In the past, the whole order has been that the Abuja politicians took over the responsibility of our party at the state and the grassroots. If God gives me the responsibility, we will return power to the
grassroots and our reward system will change.

“People that cannot vote at the ward levels, at the polling unit levels and they are now recognized in Abuja. The people in Abuja have data, contact and collections. What is politics all about if not to win election?. And if you cannot win election, you are not so important.
So, we will bring new system that our people will be very happy to take their destiny in their own hands.

“We will allow the constituencies, states to conduct congress and I am saying that because of my experiences as a state party chairman. Let the leaders in the state organize and elect popular candidates. We don’t have security, we don’t have INEC and Abuja cannot change and begin to superintend over whatever decision of the states that have been taken.

Tags PDP, Secondus

Africa Politics

Political Convention that’ll Shape Nigeria Takes Place Today

Post author By Kings UBA
Post date December 9, 2017

PDP National Convention Takes Place Today

Political Convention that’ll Shape Nigeria Takes Place Today

Today’s National convention of the opposition party in Nigeria, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is significant in all respects to political spectrum of the country.

A local newspaper, Vanguard, reports that the purpose of the convention is to elect new members of the National Working Committee (NWC) that will pilot the affairs of the party for the next four years.

“It is also expected to ratify amendments to the party constitution. Chairman, Convention Planning Committee and Delta State governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa arrived the Eagle Square at exactly 8: 32 AM, an indication the exercise will kick off in the next few hours. Another early arrival is the immediate past governor of Niger State, Dr. Babangida Aliyu”

This is the convention that will determine whether there will change of government in Nigeria come 2019 or that the status quo ante will be maintained.

The PDP, although lost power to the All Progressive Congress (APC) in 2015 remains the largest political party in Nigeria and perhaps in Africa. The party may have lost power due to some negligence to internal democratic process.

Having gone through the ‘political wilderness’, occasioned by the negligence, the PDP is putting this convention together, hoping to correct the mistakes of the past.

The country will await the outcome of today’s political event. If it goes well, good for the country, if the convention goes wrong, then people will hope and pray.

The ruling party, APC, has barely governed without any opposition party checkmating it. But for 16 years, the APC was fit for an opposition party. The party was stoically critical of every step of ruling PDP, a strategy that overtime weakened the party’s hold on power.

The Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, who was the APC National Publicity Secretary is believed to be a propagandist. Lai Mohammed deployed all skills and experiences in government opposition and propaganda to chase the PDP out of power in 2015.

Tags convention, Nigeria, PDP

Africa Latest News Politics

‘Atiku has realised the unbridled lies of the APC’

Post author By Kings UBA
Post date December 4, 2017

PDP welcomes Atiku from APC

PDP welcomes Atiku, says he has realised the unbridled lies of the APC,

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said Atiku Abubakar is welcome in the party. Atiku, a former Vice President under the PDP platform defected to the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) prelude to 2015 election. But he announced his return to the PDP on Sunday.

In a statement, the PDP National Publicity Secretary, Dayo Adeyeye said Atiku, by his moving to APC has been given the privilege of a first experience of ‘unbridled lies/deceit of the APC’

The statement read: “Formal Return To Our Party…A Welcome Development – PDP

“The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) welcomes the return of the Former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, (Wazirin Adamawa) to our great Party, the PDP today. We are indeed glad that he has realized the unbridled lies/deceit of his former Party, the All Progressive Congress (APC). The PDP remains his home; a house he was part of building and which he helped to nurture. We believe his return will add value in the process of rebuilding our Party to greater heights.

“This is another milestone recorded by the current leadership of our Party in its quest to reconcile, rebuild and restructure the PDP ahead of the 2019 General Elections and beyond. We will continue to remain transparent and dedicated to the service of this Party. Again, we want to use this opportunity to call on all our members that are still in the APC or other parties to return home. We are equally extending our invitation to all those in the APC who are frustrated by the Party’s failure to deliver the goods . Any one who is desirous of a return to the era of abundance and freedom under the PDP administration is welcome. The Umbrella is big enough to accommodate all.

“We enjoin our members nationwide to come together as one family, as we march to Eagle Square, Abuja on Saturday 9 – Sunday 10, December 2017 to elect our new leaders who will manage the affairs of our Party at the National Level. God bless the PDP! God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria”, said Adeyeye.

Tags apc, atiku, PDP

PDP Insists on Zoning of Key Positions

Post author By Kings UBA
Post date November 22, 2017

PDP Chairman, Ahmed Makarfi

PDP Insists on Zoning of Key Positions

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said it has zoned key positions in the party between North and Southern Nigeria.

However, the opposition party in Nigeria said each zone could micro-zone the positions allotted to them as they might wish.

In press conference today in Abuja, the party said any issue not resolved by zones till their expected convention would be resolved at the convention.

The party also clarified issues relating to the just concluded Anambra election and its committee membership.

“Our attention has been drawn to recent statements by some of our candidates seeking for elective party offices. We take all such statements or expressions in good faith. However, we must clarify a number of issues:

ZONING

We at Wadata only officially recognize what the Convention and NEC have done. That is zoning of positions between the North and the South.

We however recognize that both North and South may politically micro zone positions to geo-political zones and the geo-political zones to states.

The North micro-zoned and other zones are micro-zoning without recourse to PDP Headquarters.

We also understand that the South of recent is doing so but up to now have not been able to reach agreement on Chairmanship and Deputy Chairman. If this is not sorted out before the Convention it means the matter can only be settled at the Convention.

As democrats and also to avoid imposition against the wish of the majority, we have opened the race to all aspirants who disagree with the micro-zoning. Therefore sale of forms has been and will continue to be open to all within the context of North/South that NEC took a decision on.

COMMITTEES MEMBERSHIP

On membership of Committees supervising the congresses in respective states and the FCT we never took nominations from any candidate but from the States and other organs of the Party.

We wish to remind all that it’s the State Chapters that actually conduct congresses. The Committees only compile the results and attend to Appeals after which they file their reports to the Party Headquarters.

When all reports are filed by the Committees, we shall summon the States Chairmen to come with their copies and reconfirm the results at a date to be fixed and all bonafide interest groups will be welcomed to witness it. This is to reassure everybody that validly elected delegates list is not tampered with.

Commenting specifically on the issues raised by Chief Bode George through his Director-General and Prof. Tunde Adeniran, we wish to state that Chief Bode George assertions were wild and not specific.

However, Prof. Adeniran’s letter specifically mentioned 5 names out of about 216 names. While assuring him that we shall pay special attention to the places they were posted to, but we did not and could not interview the members to know their linings before calling on them to serve. Its most likely that some of the remaining 211 members are aligned to some other persons seeking elective offices including himself and Chief Bode George.

It pains us that on the one hand Chief Bode George who is fully aware of the pains we are still going through in Lagos in order to fairly and equitably carry everybody on board to the extent that we are been accused by others as siding with him is the same person accusing us of impunity.

On the preparations for the Convention, we have asked Chairmanship aspirants to make input so that they have their eyes and ears in each Committee. It was only Chief Bode George that did not attend the meeting we had with the aspirants.

ANAMBRA ELECTIONS AND CONTINUING CASTIGATIONS BY SEN. BURUJI KASHAMU

We do agree that the Anambra issue is a self inflicted injury which has been with the State since after the 2003 general elections

Irrespective of the perfections or imperfections of our Party primaries and the outcome, PDP Anambrarians had developed conflicting mindsets. We did our best to bring all under one Caretaker Committee hoping that things will work out well.

Here, we need to remind PDP members and Nigerians that it was Sen. Kashamu and those he was bankrolling that conducted parallel congresses in Edo and Ondo States. They did not stop there but took us up to Supreme Court and in the end openly endorsed and campaigned for our opponents. Their actions made us to loose the elections.

The public should however recall we neither conducted parallel congress in the Osun Senatorial bye-election nor did we campaign for our opponents. We rather directed everybody to work for the Party nominee and he won. You can clearly see who have been undermining the Party’s chances at elections.

In conclusion, we assure everybody that we shall continue to put in our best as we have done in the past seventeen months.

We remain open to attend to anybody with issues to discuss or seek clarifications provided such a person has bonafide interest in such matters”, said the party’s Publicity Secretary, Dayo Adeyeye.

Tags PDP

Africa Latest News Politics

PDP Extends Deadline for Convention Election Procedure

Post author By Kings UBA
Post date November 16, 2017

PDP Publicity Secretary, Adeyeye announced the extension

PDP Extends Deadline for Convention Election Procedure

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has issued a notice for extension of closing dates for purchase of forms and submission of forms for elective positions in their expected National Convention, December.

In a statement yesterday in Abuja by its National Publicity Secretary, Dayo Adeyeye, the opposition in Nigeria, said its National Caretaker Committee meeting today considered and approved the extension.

“The National Caretaker Committee at its meeting today 16th November 2017, observed that there have been unprecedented enthusiasm shown by Party members across all the geopolitical zones to contest for elective offices at the National Convention coming up on 9/10 December 2017. This, the NCC noted has positively increased the visibility of the Party and its activities in recent times.

“In order to further encourage Party members and make the process more open and inclusive, the NCC has decided to extend the Closing Dates for the Purchase of Nomination Forms from 19 to 29 November, 2017. “Completed Nomination Forms are now to be returned on the 30th of November, 2017. Interested members are therefore enjoined to take advantage of this extension of time”, the party said.

The national leadership caucus of Nigeria’s biggest opposition party, had said the party will hold its national convention come December 9th.

The party has been struggling to find its feet after losing power to rival All Progressive Congress (APC) in 2015, going through many legal challenges and internal crisis.

The party may have decided to pull itself together ahead the 2019 general election. Adeyeye, had told journalists that the NEC also granted waivers to new members in South-East Anambra and South-West Oyo States who recently decamped from other political parties to the PDP.

“As you know in Oyo state, so many people are joining PDP from other parties and we want to give them a level playing ground just like other members who have been in the party.

Tags PDP