Ahead of the 2023 general elections, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, will flag off its campaign Monday (today) 10th October, 2022 in Uyo, Akwa Ibom state.

The party will hit the ground running amid concern over the insistence by Rivers state Governor Nyesom Wike-led group on the resignation of the PDP national chairman, Senator Iyorchia Ayu’s resignation, if all is to be well within the major opposition party ahead of next year’s poll.

The Wike’s group has remained adamant and vowed not to have anything doing with the presidential campaign team except Ayu pills out.

In a statement Sunday by its National Organising Secretary and Director of Field Operations, Presidential Campaign Council, Hon. Umar Bature, said the rally will take place at Nest Of Champions Stadium, Uyo, the state capital.

The statement read in part: “This is to invite all Members of National Working Committee, Governors, Candidates of our Great Party, the PDP; NASS Members, NEC Members, BOT, State Chapters, Former Governors, BOT, NASS, and NWC Members, Former Ministers, and Stakeholders to the Flag-Off ceremony of our Presidential Campaign as scheduled below:

“Monday 10th October, 2022 at Nest Of Champions Stadium, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State by 10:00AM prompt.

“Please endeavour to mobilize your supporters massively to participate as we join hands with our Presidential Candidate, H.E. Atiku Abubakar, GCON, (Waziri Adamawa) to Rescue Nigeria.”

The unresolved Wike/PDP debacle

While various moves were made to reconcile the various tendencies within the party, such efforts had always come to nullity.

The call for Ayu’s removal was consequent upon the emergence of Atiku, a northerner, as the party’s presidential candidate.

Those in Wike’s camp calling for Ayu’s removal include but not limited to Governors Seyi Makinde of Oyo, Samuel Ortom of Benue, Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia and Lawrence Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu states and the party’s former deputy national chairman (South), Chief Olabode George.

The Wike-led group within the party had last month pulled out of the PDP presidential campaign council.

They vowed not to play any role in Atiku’s campaign ahead of next year’s presidential poll, insisting the party’s national chairman must resign to create a way for a southerner to occupy the party’s number one spot before backing down on their threat.

The failed moves

Observing that the cracks would affect the party’s chances, different organs of the party made several reconciliatory moves that did not yield the desired result.

One of such was the resignation of the chairman, PDP Board of Trustees (BoT), Senator Walid Jibril, who constituted a committee that failed to meet with Wike and Atiku’s camp.

In Jibrin’s place, former President of the Senate, Senator Adolphus Wabara became the PDP BoT chairman.

But the group said that ‘sacrifice’ was far from what they demanded, insisting the BoT was only advisory and that all they wanted was the party’s number one spot for equity, justice and fairness.

In another move, the PDP presidential candidate and Wike jointly constituted a committee led by Adamawa state Governor Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri and former Minister of Information and National Orientation Professor Jerry Gana. They met twice without any agreement on the way forward.

Consequently, the Wike’s camp and Atiku met in London a couple of weeks ago to also reconcile warring parties. Surprisingly, days after the meetings, both factions still engaged in bickering.

The most recent efforts for peace to reign in the major opposition party and among its leaders, was the Wabara- led BoT’s special reconciliation committee’s separate meetings with Atiku, his running mate, Okowa; and Wike.

Though Wike insisted on Ayu’s resignation, Wabara’s committee claimed they were now well informed on the crisis rocking the party.

Atiku’s stance

But after failed reconciliatory efforts, the PDP presidential candidate said nobody, not even him can force the embattled Ayu out of office.

“On the calls for the resignation or removal from office of our national chairman, however, I must reiterate what I have said severally in public and in private; the decision for Dr. Iyorchia Ayu to resign from office is personal to Dr. Ayu and, neither I nor anyone else can make that decision for him.

“As to the calls for the removal of Dr. Ayu from office, however, I will state that, as a committed democrat and firm believer in the rule of law and democratic tenets, and our party being one set up, organized and regulated by law and our constitution, it is my absolute belief that everything that we do in our party must be done in accordance with, and conformity to, the law and our constitution.

“If Dr. Ayu is to be removed from office; it must be done in accordance with the laws that set out the basis for such removal. In any event, you will all recall that the very body that is empowered by law to initiate this removal from office, has already passed a vote of confidence in him,” Atiku had said.

Group berates Wike

In a related development, a coalition of civil society organisations under the aegis of Better Life for Nigeria, has berated Governor Wike for slowing down the PDP in the resolution of the crisis rocking the party.

The coalition, in a statement Sunday by its coordinator, Waheed Abduljeleel, said the governor is not a good sportsman as his actions after the presidential primaries gave him out as an embittered loser determined to rock the boat because Atiku is a Muslim.

Chronicling Wike’s activities capable of derailing the PDP’s quest for presidency in 2023, the coalition said: “PDP as a party was founded and funded in 1998 by great politicians like Alex Ekwueme, Abubakar Rimi, Sunday Awoniyi, Solomon Lar, Atiku Abubakar, Iorchia Ayu, etc.

“The idea was to have a national party where decisions will be taken by all members, and not a party in the pocket of a single individual. Ayu said in his interview with Arise TV that he will resign if the party asks him to resign (not an individual). The NWC which is the highest decision body of the party passed a vote of confidence on Ayu and asked him to stay.

“This situation that has a presidential candidate and chairman of the party from one zone pre-election is not new. Ahmadu Ali from North central was chairman when Musa Yar’Adua from North-west was the presidential candidate between 2006-2007.

“What if Ayu resigns and Atiku fails to win, will he be given back his mandate to complete the constitutional four years?

“In any case, the PDP state excos in Lagos, Osun, Ogun, Ondo, Edo, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom, Cross-River, and Delta have thrown their support behind Ayu and passed a vote of confidence on him.

“The presidential zoning committee was about zoning the presidential ticket to South east with Peter Obi likely to get the ticket, Wike insisted that the zoning should be thrown open, knowing that GEJ got the South-south slot.

“Atiku had said that if the presidential ticket is zoned to the South east, he won’t contest. Wike’s ambition did not allow this zoning to work.”

While alleging that a top politician in the South-east was used to chase Peter Obi (now Labour Party’s presidential candidate) out of PDP, the coalition said: “Every member of the PDP sacrificed for the party at one point or the other. Some even died in the process.

Others used their personal resources to fund the party.

“Wike wants to foist a chairman on the PDP that will work against Atiku so that Atiku will lose the 2023 election and leave the PDP for him and his group, post-2023. They need a party chairman that will do their bidding like what Adamu Mu’azu did to GEJ in 2015.”

‘Reconciliation not 100-meter dash’

But when asked whether the party and its presidential candidate had called Wike’s bluff, PDP National Publicity Secretary Debo Ologunagba said political reconciliation is not a 100-meter dash but a marathon process.

Ologunagba said “reconciliation is ongoing”, adding that “very soon we will announce the good news.”

Ologunagba continued: “All organs of the party are working almost overtime to ensure that there is harmony. We have robust differences and resolution mechanisms within the party to discuss this.

“Reconciliation differences in the political party is not 100-meter dash, it is a marathon process. The process is ongoing and very soon we will announce the good news.

“We shall all work together as a party to support of our presidential candidate to rescue and rebuild Nigeria,” Ologunagba said Saturday in an interview with Blueprint.

 APC inaugurates women campaign

In a related development, the Organising Committee of the Tinubu/Shettima Women Presidential Campaign Team said its various committees would be inaugurated Monday, October 10, 2022.

The committees would be inaugurated at the Presidential Villa Abuja.

First Lady Aisha Muhammadu Buhari was last week announced as the grand patron of the women wing of the Tinubu/Shettima Presidential Campaign Team.

The wife of the APC presidential candidate, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, and the wife of the Vice Presidential candidate, Hajiya Nana Kashim Shettima, will serve as chairman and co-chairman respectively.

“The announcement of our women campaign team has drawn positive reactions from across the country, with many Nigerians wondering why other parties are not making similar efforts regarding gender mainstreaming in their respective presidential campaigns.

“Others have noted that the APC’s women’s campaign team, comprising over 1,200 women drawn from across the country, further bolsters the party’s gender-sensitive credentials as the APC is also the only major political party to have a female gubernatorial candidate in the 2023 election cycle.

“The women’s campaign team will enjoy a degree of autonomy and organize its own programmes, and that there will be activities at the national, zonal and state levels.

Efforts are also reportedly ongoing to rally the thousands of women-focused support groups affiliated with the APC for a nationwide mass mobilization project,” a source at the Organising Committee of the Tinubu/Shettima Women Presidential Campaign Team told Blueprint.

Pro-Tinubu groups okay BoT chair

Similarly, the National Working Committee of CityBoy Movement and National Coalition Group (NCG)-the support groups working for the success of the APC presidential flag bearer, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his running mate, Kashim Shettima, in the 2023 general elections – have passed a vote of confidence in their Board of Trustees (BoT) Chairman, Hon. Francis Shoga.

In a statement made available to Blueprint at the weekend by the Director of Media and Publicity of the CityBoy-NCG, Aminat Aminu-Isah, the group said the vote of confidence was passed on behalf of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the groups by the chairman of the organising committee of the Cityboy-NCG, Hon. Olushayo Adeyemi, at an appraisal and evaluation meeting which held Friday in Abuja.

The statement said the meeting was to examine the success and shortfalls of the concert organised by the group on September 28, to show support and usher in the electioneering campaigns which commenced same day.

According to the duo of Olushayo Adeyemi and the co-chairman of the organising committee, Dr. Hassan Sadiq, it became necessary as Shoga had demonstrated capacity and commitment that would sustain the tempo of activities already lined up towards the actualisation of the Tinubu/Shettima presidency in 2023.

“We were all at the Unity Fountain last week Thursday. I must tell you that we couldn’t have had it better than we did.

“The concert held in support of our principal was nothing but a success. For us to do more with regards to strategic plans, we must ensure that we have someone who is capable to take charge as the BOT Chairman, and you will all agree with me that Shoga is the man for the job,” Olushayo said.

In support of the move, the statement said Dr Bako Mohammed, national chairman of NCG and other NWC members agreed with the submission of the chairman of the organising committee of the concert, adding that the price for greatness is responsibility.

They called on the Presidential Campaign Council to give more responsibility to the group, saying “they have shown commitment, capacity and dedication to do more.”

The CityBoy-NCG consists of professionals, artisans and students across the 774 local government areas (LGA), wards and polling units across the country.