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Akinwande Soji-Ojo
Sixty members of the House of Representatives elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), have asked the party’s acting national chairman, Umar Damagum, to resign.
The 60 lawmakers, led by the PDP member representing Ideato North/Ideato South Federal Constituency of Imo State, Ikenga Ugochinyere, demanded the resignation of Damagum at a press conference in Abuja, on Monday.
They accused him of being in bed with the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
The lawmakers also accused Damagum of plotting to use the Federal High Court to legalise the extension of the tenure of local government chairmen in Rivers State.
“We demand the immediate resignation of Damagum as Acting National Chairman of PDP for anti-party activities and allow the North Central to produce the Acting Chairman as clearly stated in the PDP Constitution or watch us reconsider our membership of the party in the months ahead if the right thing is not done.
“We also call for the removal of Damagum by the party’s National Executive Committee with further sanctions against him for his anti-party activities.
“It is our call on Damagum to immediately resign so that the party can midwife a process and hand over to someone from North Central in line with the provisions of our great party. It is also our call to the leaders of our party from the North Central, Governor Caleb Mutfwang of Plateau, Senators David Mark, Bukola Saraki, Abba Moro, Gabriel Suswam and Babangida Aliyu, to rise up now and save the soul of the part,” Ugochinyere said.
On the alleged doctoring of caretaker committee members lists in Rivers and 10 other states, Ugochinyere said: “This story is quite unfortunate, and I can confirm to you all that it is not a rumour but a fact. We have obtained very credible intelligence on the goings in our party’s Wadata House national secretariat, and it does not sound right at all. We currently have a national leadership in the PDP that is in bed with the APC and working extremely hard to hand over the party to the APC.
“Following the removal of Iyorchia Ayu as national chairman of our party and assumption of office by Damagum, who was elected as Deputy National Chairman to act in his stead, the party has only known misfortune and has abdicated its responsibility as the leading opposition party in the country. That role which Nigerians would have loved the PDP to play as an institution it truly is has been abdicated for a plate of porridge.”
Describing Damagum as unfit to lead the party to battle, the lawmakers said the party’s acting national chairman “was only constitutionally allowed to step in, hold the fort and midwife the process through which the North Central zone where the chairmanship of the party was originally zone to present another person who would complete the slot of the North Central.”
“Not only did Damagun hold tight unto the seat for well over a year now, he has abdicated every responsibility of the office of the chairman of PDP and is very comfortable serving APC interests.
“There had been an agreement of a broad spectrum of the party leadership when it became clear that Damagum was not interested in conducting elections, but in appointing caretaker committees in at least 19 states where the tenures of the state and local government leaders were expiring and extend the tenures of these officials by three months. This decision, which was made to cover every state, was the wisdom that restrained Damagum from announcing a wholesale list of a majority of caretaker committees populated by APC agents masquerading as PDP members.
“However, despite that decision to retain everybody, Mr Damagum went ahead and received a list of APC agents and announced them as members and leaders of the PDP local government caretaker committees wholesomely in Rivers State and partially in at least 10 other states. This is a direct attempt to kill the PDP and ensure it goes into extinction,” they said.
The lawmakers also accused Damagum of failing to retain most of the states in the South East, noting that today, the party is only in charge of Enugu State, which it literally “snatched from the jaw of a lion.”
“The party lost Benue, Abia and Sokoto States. The PDP leadership kept mute while the PDP state and federal lawmakers lost their seats at the tribunal and Court of Appeal on the grounds that were obviously untenable, which have since been upturned by the Supreme Court. If the party had spoken up and raised the necessary alarm, all our colleagues in Imo and Plateau States particularly would have been with us in the assembly today,” Ugochinyere said.
Addressing the acting national chairman directly, Ugochinyere said: “You have a chance to resign immediately, leave, or be embarrassed out of the party. At least 60 of us in the PDP in the national assembly will severe all relationships with the Damagum leadership until he leaves office. At the scheduled National Executive Committee meeting, if Damagum by any maneuvering however conjectured, remains in office with the help of his APC friends at the end of the day; the party is now heading to the final slaughter shed.”
Meanwhile, Kingsley Chinda, the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives and a known ally of the Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, was absent at the press conference.
