*As Wike raises hope of reconciliation
Tuesday’s reconciliatory meeting between the Board of Trustees of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers Sate ended without any agreement on way forward to end the lingering crisis that is rocking the party
PDP BoT chairman, Senator Adolphus Wabara who spoke to journalis at the end of the over four hours meeting, said no conclusion has been reached on the search for truce in the crisis rocking the party.
Wabara said, “This meeting took about four hours. We have not concluded. It’s always easy to destroy, but to make peace takes some time. I think we are better informed, gotten some information.“You know every coin has two sides. We have been briefed by his Excellency. So we will go back to Abuja to re-digest all we gathered from His Excellency, very frank talks, but one good thing is that this family remains one, still under that umbrella called PDP.
“And by the special grace of God, we will end up victorious and end up at the Villa in 2023 with his (Wike’s) cooperation and support of all the other governors, four of them. No doubt we will make progress.“In concrete terms, it’s work in progress. This is the first time the BOT is coming to see his Excellency and for your information he is also a member. We rubbed minds. We will find a solution to all the problems, very soon.
“The presidential campaigns have started and it is the policy of our party that we all go home and His Excellency is here, campaigning for the party. I will go to Abia state where I come from to campaign. There is no ballot box for me in Abuja. Everyone of us here is from one zone or the other.“Our governor here is a PDP governor. Even if he hasn’t come out to campaign, he has campaigned already with all the projects he has given Rivers and Nigeria as we speak.
“I’m an Acting Chairman of the BOT. I don’t have the exclusiveness to tell you what the BOT will come up with. We have come here, we are going back. We will convene a meeting of the BOT, brief them, and that’s when Nigeria would hear where the BOT stands.
“Since it’s an advisory body and conscience of the party, we will be there to tell the party the truth, nothing but the truth on our findings.
Meanwhile, Governor Nyesom Wike has raised hope of a possible full reconciliation among the warring factions of the PDP
Speaking on the outcome of the meeting, Wike said: “To add to what the BoT Acting Chairman has said, peace is the most important thing to have unity. Even if it takes you longer days, what is important is that the house is united for the war coming ahead.
“So the issue of whether they achieve peace today or not is immaterial. What matters is that at the end of the day, PDP is a united house. I think that is the message being conveyed.
“We have said repeatedly that we are not leaving the party, but that does not mean there are no internal issues that ought to be sorted out. I think what they are here for is to sort out some internal issues. That point has been made.
“Of course I’m hopeful. It is only a dead person that is not hopeful. Being alive is ultimately that you are hopeful.”
2023: APC challenges Atiku, Obi to declare their health status
By Ezeocha Nzeh
The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) have described the public outcry on the health status of its presidential candidate, Bola Ahmed GTinubu as a distraction which should not be part of campaign issues ahead of the 20203 presidential election
National Publicity Secretary of the party, Felix Morka, who wondered why the opposition parties are dwelling much on the health status of Tinubu, noted that the APC presidential candidate is fit as a fiddle, adding that his health has never been an issue as he is no under any obligay6tion to disclose it to the public.
He challenged both Atiku and Obi to make their own health records public. “Our candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu is as fit as anyone. I am not saying this to be political. For the purpose of this discussion, you have raised the question of his health.
“What I am saying from my knowledge even though I am not a medical doctor, from observing him for being around him, engaging with him, and many times over the last few months that I have been at the campaign council, in meetings with him and observing him meeting with others, his schedule will make anyone else think that they are as fit as a fiddle to actually get dizzy.
“I have been around him for six hours uninterrupted. I have watched him go to meetings back to back and walk people to the door as they leave. We can have a conversation about the body being old or aged or being challenged while the mind is still very fit. We can have that conversation, but the point I am making is that from the question you asked, all I can say is that for a man of his age, Bola Ahmed Tinubu is strong and has his wits about him. Physically I have seen him pray.
“Not even people of my age or your age. Who can manage six hours of none stop meetings without a break,? one team after the other. That is what he does every day at the council. Who says that the older you are the more vulnerable or the quicker you are to the grave? Who says that? And that is the assumption I find a bit disturbing. Because the fellow is an elderly person, therefore he is going to kick the bucket. My point is that there is no assumption that should inform our conversation around those who compete. I don’t know of any candidate in this election who has offered us their own medical records. Even the younger ones among them, no one has done that. I am not privy to that and I have not seen anyone”, he said.
Asked whether it would be out of place for the APC to set the ball rolling, Morka said it would not be a wrong idea, but that; “Atiku Abukabar should start it. Peter Obi may start it”.
“Anyone else may start it. It doesn’t mean that because we are a ruling party, therefore, the initiative to start it must come from us because that also played into this whole narrative that a particular candidate may have something about himself that should concern us. I rejected that because that doesn’t support my observation and is certainly not supported by natural occurrences. The people who are younger may even be sicker”, he added.
On why Tinubu did not show up at the signing of the peace accord last week, Morka said the APC standard bearer had a prior engagement outside the country which could not have been shelved.
He said; “It is not because he was ill. That was not the reason he was not there. My point is that Asiwaju was absent from the peace accord not because of ill health, but because he had a prior, scheduled engagement to be held elsewhere and he was already out. And as you can see for the last couple of days we are getting a feel of what is going on with him. He is fine and I am sure he will be back in the country very soon”.
APC also expressed optimism that the Rivers state chapter of the party would be adequately carried along in the affairs of the presidential campaign council.
The state chapter had alleged that none of its nominees was included in the council.
“I believe they sent the names directly to the council but with you also understand that the council is still working on the list of its members. They haven’t released the comprehensive list. By the time that is done, you may find out that those who think they were excluded were not actually excluded”, he stated.
2023: Labour Party takes over APC secretariat in Enugu
The Enugu State chapter of the All Progressives Congress, (APC) has lost its state secretariat to the Labour Party, following its inability to pay the rent for the property, has been taken over by the Labour Party.
The APC, which has been ridden with internal crisis in the state was ejected by the owner of the property, who in turn offered it to the Labour Party ahead of the 2023 general elections
It APC crisis deppened after the party’s congress last year, following the emergence of Barr. Ugochukwu Agballah as the State chairman.
It wpould be recalled that a delegation of the party’s stakeholders in the State were at the APC national Secretariat last month to demand for the removal of Ugo Agballa and setting up of a caretaker committee that would manage the affairs of the Enugu APC and lead the party into the 2023 elections.
However, Agballa dismissed the stakeholders, including the Foreign Affairs Minister, Mr. Geoffrey Onyeama and a former Senate President, Senator Ken Nnamani, describing them as members of he APC in Abuja, bu6 working for 6the PDP in Enugu.
It was gathered further that the Chairman, Agballa has been operating from the South-East zonal office of the party, as the owner of the building housing the APC’s State Secretariat, located at No 126 Park Avenue, GRA Enugu, and dragged the party to court over rent issues.
Labour Party has now finally unveiled the same building as its State Secretariat.
2023: Nigeria’s problems cannot be fixed by those who caused it, SDP’s Adebayo warns
The Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential candidate, Adewole Adebayo, Tuesday, warned Nigerian electorate ahead of the 2023 elections that country’s challenging problems cannot be fixed by those who caused it
The presidential candidate, who also accused Nigerian politicians of indulging in the illegal act of vote-buying, warned that that the problems would be aggravated if voters allow politicians who are being accused of putting the country in its current state are voted back to power in 2023.
Adewole, who was a guest at book launch in Abuja posited that he has studied the challenges confronting Nigeria in areas of insecurity, education, health care, poverty, as well as other vices, adding that he has also earmarked detailed solution points and strategies which he assured would take the country oput of the challenges when elected as president in 2023
This came as he commented on the proposed plan by the National Assembly to set up a tribunal to prosecute electoral offenders.
The move, according to the legal expert, would amount to nothing given the urge of Nigerian politicians for votes.
Adebayo further described lawmakers in the country as hypocrites, adding that majority of them bought votes to get to where they are today.
“The problem of Nigeria is hypocrisy. Majority of those in the National Assembly are vote buyers even though they’re passing laws against the practice. It is easier to come from the buyers. Many of them did vote buying in their primaries. They are only passing the law they know they are going to disobey,” he said.
The presidential candidate argued that “there is need in this country to call out people who engage in wrong things.”
He blamed Nigeria’s situation on the paucity of good leaders and lack of political understanding by Nigerian voters.
He charged Nigerians to be politically active in order to drive the country forward.
He said: “Consciously or unconsciously, we’re saying that the issue with Nigeria is lack of credible leaders. Other things needed for the country to grow are available and will work if right leaders are in place. Good decisions, not lamentation, can change the country for the better.
“We need to outgrow skepticism and cynicism and come out tenaciously to do what is right. Nigerian voters are not as powerless as they have been made to believe. All you need to do is know what candidates stand for and implications of the spot we’re today.
“My interaction with the people shows that they know what’s right but sometimes don’t want to make the sacrifice. The fact that there is hunger and poverty in the country shouldn’t make us take wrong steps. Misinterpretation of politics is responsible for citizens’ wrong decisions and lack of interest in the system.”
