GOODLUCK JONATHAN
The Arewa Consultative Forum has criticised 18 governors of the Peoples Democratic Party for endorsing a single tenure of four years for President Goodluck Jonathan.
But as the ACF cried fowl over the development, one of the PDP governors, Mr. Theodore Orji, vowed that he and his colleagues would deliver the South-East to Jonathan.
The Action Congress of Nigeria had earlier on Sunday warned that the “bitter contest” by aspirants for the PDP presidential ticket was a threat to Nigeria’s continued existence.
The ACF had, in a statement on Sunday, said it doubted if the Federal Government would conduct free, fair and credible elections in 2011, going by the ‘flagrant abuse of the PDP constitution.’
According to the forum, the PDP has ‘”decided to throw away all forms of decorum in the conduct of its affairs.”
It argued in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Anthony Sani, that if the PDP governors believed that individual constitutional rights to contest elections was sacrosanct, they should not have agreed to limit Jonathan’s ambition to a single tenure of four years.
It added,“ Our reaction to the position of the PDP and some of its governors that President Jonathan has the constitutional right to contest for the presidency in 2011 against party constitution on rotation and zoning, whose sequence has been explained to be between North and South by the PDP National Chairman, Chief Okwesilieze Nwodo, to the late Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, are that they ignore the Supreme Court’s ruling in the case of Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State.”
The ACF further argued that rotation and zoning were not peculiar to the Nigerian situation as a means of addressing the collective challenges of unity in diversity.
It pointed out that rotation and zoning were also being practised by some developed nations like Switzerland and Australia as well as some international organisations like the United Nations, European Union, and the Economic Community of West African States.
Niyi Odebode and Olusola Fabiyi and Segun Olatunji
The Arewa Consultative Forum has criticised 18 governors of the Peoples Democratic Party for endorsing a single tenure of four years for President Goodluck Jonathan.
But as the ACF cried fowl over the development, one of the PDP governors, Mr. Theodore Orji, vowed that he and his colleagues would deliver the South-East to Jonathan.
The Action Congress of Nigeria had earlier on Sunday warned that the “bitter contest” by aspirants for the PDP presidential ticket was a threat to Nigeria’s continued existence.
The ACF had, in a statement on Sunday, said it doubted if the Federal Government would conduct free, fair and credible elections in 2011, going by the ‘flagrant abuse of the PDP constitution.’
According to the forum, the PDP has ‘”decided to throw away all forms of decorum in the conduct of its affairs.”
It argued in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Anthony Sani, that if the PDP governors believed that individual constitutional rights to contest elections was sacrosanct, they should not have agreed to limit Jonathan’s ambition to a single tenure of four years.
It added,“ Our reaction to the position of the PDP and some of its governors that President Jonathan has the constitutional right to contest for the presidency in 2011 against party constitution on rotation and zoning, whose sequence has been explained to be between North and South by the PDP National Chairman, Chief Okwesilieze Nwodo, to the late Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, are that they ignore the Supreme Court’s ruling in the case of Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State.”
The ACF further argued that rotation and zoning were not peculiar to the Nigerian situation as a means of addressing the collective challenges of unity in diversity.
It pointed out that rotation and zoning were also being practised by some developed nations like Switzerland and Australia as well as some international organisations like the United Nations, European Union, and the Economic Community of West African States.
The Abia State governor, Mr. Orji, said in Abuja that all the governors in the South-East had embarked on mobilisation of the people for Jonathan.
Orji, who was not at the governors’ meeting where the decision to endorse Jonathan was taken,said, “I was not at the meeting where my colleagues declared their support for the President, but I can tell you that I am with them.
“You will recall that all the governors elected on the platform of the party from the zone have all pledged their loyalty to him and we told the whole world that we would not vie for the same office.
“Not only that, the Ohaneze Ndigbo has also said that the zone is for him.
“Let me reiterate that we will deliver the votes for Mr. President at the PDP presidential primaries.”
Meanwhile, the ACN has said that Nigeria has never witnessed a “bitter contest for a party‘s ticket as the nation is now witnessing between Jonathan and a former Vice- President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.”
According to the party, the crises in the PDP have led to “the endless manipulation of the country‘s electoral law.”
It noted in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, that less than a few months to the 2011 elections, no one knew the position of the Electoral Act on the poll.
The party said, ‘‘Threats and counter-threats are flying around. Words like violent change, treason and destablisation are being used freely, when all that Nigerians would like to hear is how each candidate will help turn around the fortune of the country, if elected.
“Both sides have crossed the line of decency in trying to outwit one another, with various nebulous groups using newspaper advertisements to splash mud and more mud on the opposing candidate.”
The ACN said that because many PDP leaders had been compromised one way or another, they lacked the moral authority to stop the “dogfight.”
It wondered that “a party that prides itself as the largest political party in Africa cannot even agree on how to pick its candidates! What more evidence is needed to confirm that the PDP is a house built on sand, which will eventually collapse?
‘‘Unfortunately, the desperation on both sides is not borne out of the candidates‘ love for Nigeria, or how prepared they are to lead Nigeria out of the doldrums to which it has been consigned by a succession of inept leaders, especially in the last 10 years plus of democratic rule.”
When contacted on the ACN statement by one of our correspondents, the PDP National Publicity Secretary, Prof. Rufau Alkali, said he would get back on the telephone. But as at 8.15pm on Sunday, he had not responded.
Source:Punch
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