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The Peoples Democratic Party has shut down its twitter handle, @PDPnigeria and launched a new one, @officialpdpnig.
This was contained in statement signed by Chinwe Nnorom, the Head of PDP Publicity Unit, on Monday in Abuja.
The statement said the decision became necessary due to the frequent unauthorized and most times embarrassing tweets that emanated from the handle tweeted by the handlers claiming to represent the PDP.
It said: “Following these developments, the party hereby informs all its members, supporters, friends, the media and general public to ignore and disregard any tweet from the Handle @pdpnigeria forthwith.
“In view of the above, the party has immediately re-launched a new Handle, @officialpdpnig to form part of the social media platform of our great party for ease of communication, administration and control.”
It added that the PDP leadership also frowned at the incessant and unauthorized statements being issued by some party members purported to have spoken for and on behalf of the party.
The party recalled that its National Publicity Secretary, on June 17, 2015, issued a statement entitled: “PDP disowns group over unauthorized statements on Buhari.”
It said the party had also urged members nationwide to desist from making official statements on its behalf without authorization.
The statement added that “The PDP hereby states unequivocally that the position of Director of New Media is non-existent and alien to the PDP Establishment Manual, and has not appointed Deji Adeyanju as PDP Director of New Media.
“For emphasis, Social Media is one of the Units in the Publicity Division of the Party and not a separate directorate, division or unit.
“For clarification, the National Publicity Secretary, Dayo Adeyeye, is currently the Chief Spokesman and Image-maker of our party in line with the PDP Constitution.
“Consequently, nobody is allowed to issue official statement or speak for and on behalf of the party except authorized by the party hierarchy to do so.
However, Markafi, Monday evening, clarified that Adeyanju was not sacked. He said that the party recognises Mr. Adeyanju and the new media department, but added that their activities would be streamlined going forward.
He explained that the leadership of the party only had issues with some “far-reaching statements” distributed by Mr. Adeyanju “without clearance.”