As PDP Crisis Deepens: Jonathan begs Govs Aliyu, Lamido

The alleged resolve by majority of the governors of the
People's Democratic Party (PDP) to remove the embattled
National Chairman of the party, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur,
forced the Presidency to suspend the meeting of the Board of
Trustees (BoT) and National Executive Committee, NEC,
Sunday Vanguard has learnt.

It also emerged that President Goodluck Jonathan wanted the
party leadership to have more time to persuade warring
Governor Babangida Aliyu of Niger State and his Jigawa
State counterpart, Alhaji Sule Lamido, to return fully to the
PDP before the NEC meeting.

The NEC meeting, earlier fixed for Wednesday, January 8,
will now hold on January 16, with the BoT meeting scheduled
for January 15 and the National Caucus meeting slated for
January 14.

It was gathered that the Presidency got strong evidence that
the anti-Tukur forces, led by a South-south governor and a
minister, who is also from the South-south, compelled the
party hierarchy to postpone the meetings.

A party leader told Sunday Vanguard, last night, that the
governor, who has the ears of many other PDP governors, was
frontally opposed to the continued retention of Tukur and had
successfully mobilised for the removal of the party chairman
during the NEC meeting.

The governor was said to have met and agreed with the South-
south minister, who is also close to Jonathan, to impress upon
other governors to do all that was necessary to remove Tukur
at the meeting.

However, Jonathan, who is opposed to disgracing the party
boss out of office, reportedly asked for the postponement of
the two meetings to allow for peace to reign.

The argument of the governor and the minister is that apart
from being loyal to Jonathan, Tukur has allowed the party to
be factionalised to a point that five governors left.
But the pro-Jonathan camp within the party allegedly argued
for the retention of Tukur because of his exceptional loyalty to
the president.

The meeting was also said to have been postponed at the
instance of the president to give the party leadership more
time to persuade Governors Aliyu and Lamido to forget the
past and fully return to the party ahead of the 2015 elections.
Jonathan was alleged to have expressed worry that the true
position of the two governors on the party remained unknown
even though they did not defect along with their five
colleagues in the G7 last December to the opposition All
Progressive Congress, APC.

But the Secretary of the PDP BoT, Senator Walid Jibrin,
explained that the meetings were postponed for logistics
reason and to enable members return from their Christmas and
New Year break.

"We actually want to have a full house during the meetings so
that all party issues could be effectively discussed," Jibrin
said.

It will be recalled that prior to the defection of Governors
Abdulfatah Ahmed of Kwara; Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko
of Sokoto; Musa Rabiu Kwankwaso of Kano; Murtala Nyako
of Adamawa and Chibuike Amaechi of Rivers to APC, there
was pressure on Tukur to convene the NEC meeting where the
problems of the PDP would be addressed against the backdrop
that the last NEC was held before the August 31, 2013 Special
National Convention.

The NEC meeting ought to have taken place in the third week
of December last year, but was shelved for inexplicable
reasons.