PDP crisis: Tukur fights back

ABUJA — The embattled Chairman of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, who was boxed into a corner last week by the governors on the party’s platform, has decided to flex his muscles with the elevation of the party’s Deputy National Secretary, Solomon Onwe, to the office of National Secretary.

Besides,  the  warring sides in the leadership crisis rocking the party will this morning try to seize opportunities created by  President Goodluck Jonathan’s intervention last week.

Tukur, who was last week saved from the fury of the party’s governors by President Jonathan, it was learnt last night, is today set to maximize his gain from the court judgment that ousted the National Secretary, Col. Olagunsoye Oyinlola (rtd.) by installing a national secretary.

Supporters of Tukur, including some party elders, were yesterday, also whipping up sentiments, claiming that the push against Tukur by the governors was an attempt by them to cage President Jonathan ahead of the 2015 presidential election.

The governors, meanwhile, were,  weekend, perfecting their response to the legal problems generated by the court judgment against Oyinlola, who is perceived to be a supporter of the governors.

One of the strategies of the governors, it was learnt, is to press home what they claim as Tukur’s uncaring attitude towards many state chapters of the party. The governors, it was also learnt, would show that the national chairman did not sympathise with many state chapters of the party affected by the flood disaster that recently affected many states in the country.


PDP Chairman, Bamanga Tukur

The crisis in the PDP broke out last October after the National Working Committee, NWC, dissolved the executive committee of the Adamawa State chapter of the party led by Alhaji Umaru Kugama. The dissolution of the Kugama executive backed by Governor Murtala Nyako was seen as a deliberate act by Tukur to weaken the governor, an action other PDP governors saw as an affront which could also be used against them in future.

Despite the insistence of the NWC that it would not rescind the decision, the same body, last week, disowned the dissolution after the governors assembled in Abuja with a threat to dissolve the NWC.

Tukur had described the reversal by the NWC members who did not  consult him prior to the reversal by the 10 NWC members as treachery.

The crisis in the party, however, took a new dimension last Friday after a court in Abuja sacked Oyinlola as the national secretary of the body on the ground that he was not validly nominated by the South-West zone of the party.

Apparently aiming to cash in on the misfortune that befell Oyinlola, Vanguard learnt yesterday that Tukur was now set to name Oyinlola’s deputy, Onwe, as the national secretary of the party today.


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