…As govs, Wike, others draw battle line
From Ismail Omipidan, Abuja and Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa
The crisis of confidence rocking the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) appears to be festering, with no end in sight.
Just when many thought that with the seeming resolution of who the authentic National Secretary is between Senator Samuel Anyanwu and Hon. Sunday Udeh-Okoye, the party was set to bounce back, another crisis is rearing its ugly head, with the South -South Governors spoiling for a showdown with the former Rivers State Governor and FCT minister, Nyesom Wike.
Reinforcing the argument that the PDP is on the path of resolving its crisis, a chieftain of the party and former spokesman to the former Vice President Namadi Sambo, Umar Sani, said “The PDP you are complaining about has very recently taken steps to resolve the crisis in its ranks. There is now a clear path that the issue of who the Secretary of the party is has been resolved, and he is Udeh -Okoye. This is the result of the actions of the PDP governors, the Board of Trustees, and critical stakeholders. The matter was resolved at the end of the National Working Committee meeting. A date has been fixed for the next meeting on March 13, showing that the PDP is moving fast towards resolving its internal squabbles and putting the party on a trajectory that could even lead the coalition.”
But the renewed battle between the South -South Governors and the FCT minister, Wike, over the control of the zone, is an indication that the PDP crisis appears to be far from over.
Since 1999 South-South has been the fortress of the PDP, until 2008, when the defunct Action Congress (AC), made an incursion into the zone, with the emergence of Senator Adams Oshiomhole as Edo State Governor. After his eight years reign in Edo, he succeeded in producing a successor, in person of Godwin Obaseki. But midway into his first tenure, Obaseki fell out with Oshiomhole, and so through him, Edo returned to the PDP.
However, after last year’s election, the All Progressives Congress (APC) got back the state from the PDP. Before then, Cross River State, after several years of being under the firm control of the PDP, fell into the hands of the APC. Therefore, as it stands today, APC has two of the six states in the South-South.
With the South -East already out of the grip of the PDP, the party, Saturday Sun gathered, appears to be doing everything within its powers to ensure it does not lose its face in the South-South, where it appears to control more states than any of the remaining five geo-political zones in the country. But the latest battle between the former Rivers Governor and the South-South Governors appears to be threatening that grip.
On Saturday, February 22, the zone purportedly held a zonal congress. Signs that all was not well with the PDP in the zone emerged when Chief Felix Omemu from Bayelsa State, as the Zonal Secretary, raised the alarm over the notice of a Zonal Executive Meeting (ZEM) issued by the Zonal Chairman, South-South, Chief Dan Orbih from Edo State.
Omemu in a statement issued in Yenagoa argued that Orbih could not unilaterally call for a Zonal Executive Meeting without recourse to the Zonal Working Committee (ZWC).
According to him, the Zonal Executive Meeting was supposed to be preceded by the Zonal Working Committee meeting.
Hear him: “In line with Section 26 (2c) of our party’s Constitution as amended in 2017, there was no such a time that the Zonal Working Committee meeting being a precursor to the Zonal Executive Committee agreed on any reports to be discussed at the Saturday’s (February 15) scheduled meeting.
“As the Zonal Secretary of the party, I am therefore, not aware of such a meeting that purportedly resolved that ZWC could go ahead to convene the highest meeting of the party leaders in the zone and so, I wish to distance myself from such an illegal ZEC meeting and gathering being called by Chief Dan Orbih,’’ he said.
Omemu further discredited the proposed meeting by appealing to political leaders in the South-South zone to stay away from the meeting as the intention was at variance with the interest of the PDP.
“I also wish to call on my colleagues in the zone to boycott Saturday’s meeting, whose agenda remains suspicious and may not likely serve the general interest of the party as it is clear that the majority of the leaders of the party in the zone were not duly consulted before calling for the meeting.
“By this statement, I am placing on alert the key PDP leaders in the South-South zone including our state governors, former governors on the platform of the PDP, members of the National Assembly from the zone, Principal Officers of the State Houses of Assembly from the zone, members of the National Working Committee from the zone and also State Chairmen of our party from the zone.
“I urge the leaders of the party in the zone to call Chief Orbih to order, (so as) to avoid any untoward consequences of allowing an illegal meeting to be held in the zone’’ Omemu added.
Saturday Sun gathered that Omemu’s submission forced several political leaders, including all the elected governors of PDP from the zone, to stay away from the meeting. However, some other zonal officers and party members sympathetic to Wike attended the meeting.
To confer legitimacy on the ZEC meeting he called, Orbih had convened a ZWC meeting where the issue of the zonal congress and that of Omemu’s statement were tabled. It was an opportunity for Omemu’s opponents to take him to the cleaners. They took turns to lampoon him for what they called an attempt ‘’to sow the seed of discord in the zone’’.
Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly, Martin Chike Amaewhule moved a motion for the suspension of Omemu for gross misconduct, and the motion was seconded by Godwin Offiono, a member of Cross River State House of Assembly.
Following the suspension of Omemu, a fellow Bayelsan from Ogbia Local Government Area, George Turnah, the Zonal Legal Adviser was appointed to replace him to function as the Zonal Secretary in an acting capacity, a move that has now dragged the Bayelsa chapter of the party into the crisis.
Irked by Turnah’s acceptance of the position of acting Zonal Secretary, the State Working Committee of the party in an emergency meeting presided over by the Chairman, Solomon Agwana, less than 24 hours after Turnah’s appointment, voted unanimously to suspend him from party activities in the state.
According to the State Working Committee (SWC), its decision to suspend Turnah was premised on the PDP Constitution, as provided in Section 57(3), 58 (1) (h), and 59 (4).
It added that it would take further steps to refer the matter to the appropriate Disciplinary Committee to handle within the period of his suspension.
However, the executive of Ogbia Ward 9, where Turnah hails from, led by its Chairman, Progress Ederi, has since stepped in. The Ward did not only pass a vote of confidence in Turnah but also vehemently rejected his suspension by the SWC.
“By the Constitution of the People’s Democratic Party, only the Ward Executive Committee can suspend the membership of Hon. George Turnah, and not the State Working Committee.
“We, therefore, reject and condemn the purported suspension of our leader, Hon. George Turnah by the Bayelsa State Working Committee of the party as they do not possess any such powers under the Constitution of the party to suspend an officer, higher in rank than all of them in the State Working Committee,’’ the ward leadership declared.
At the zonal leadership level where the crisis emanated from, factions had also emerged, with Turnah and Omemu laying claims to the position of the Zonal Secretary. While a faction upturned the suspension of Turnah by the SWC, another faction reaffirmed Omemu as the Secretary.
The confusion forced other leaders in the zone led by the party chairmen in the six states to intervene to provide some stability. The zonal leaders, through a statement, passed a vote of confidence in the four governors elected on the platform of the party. They also reaffirmed Omemu as the Zonal Secretary and cautioned against what they described as “negative supremacy tussle and perfidy by some members of the party.”
The zonal leaders also picked holes in the meeting convened by Orbih, stressing that it was “illegal and unconstitutional, as they could not secure the required two-thirds majority as provided in section 26(3).”
Accordingly, the zonal leaders stated that the implication was that all decisions taken at the meeting remained null and void and of no effect.
However, despite the announcement by the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party that the South-South zonal congress had been put on hold, Orbih went ahead to organise the congress on Saturday, February 22, where Orbih and Turnah were elected Chairman and Secretary respectively.
This is just as Wike threw an open challenge to the governors and the NWC that no other zonal congress would take place.
“The South-South Zone is the strongest zone of the PDP in Nigeria. It has always been and will always be. There is no part of the constitution that says congress should be postponed because of a wedding or travelling.
“There has never been a congress where every delegate was present. The constitution did not say the National Working Committee should conduct a congress but the zone. I want to assure you that this is the final zonal congress of the South-South Zone. After the election today, no other zonal congress will hold.
“This is our job, our terrain, and we are not new to this. Nobody can intimidate me and I don’t need to be a governor,” Wike had declared.
Since Wike’s bombshell, the NWC of the party had responded through a letter dated February 25th, and signed by its acting National Chairman, Amb Umar Iliya Damagum, and National Secretary, Rt Hon S.K.E Udeh-Okoye to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), officially notifying the commission of the postponement of its South-South zonal congress.
The implication of the NWC’s letter which has the backing of the PDP Governors is that the zonal congress was not recognised by the national leadership of the party. From all indications, the die appears cast for the commencement of a long-drawn battle for the control of the party in the South-South zone, ahead of the 2027 elections.
