Over the aftermath of the PDP’s presidential primary and the ensuing crisis surrounding the choice of a running mate, the PDP’s Board of Trustees (BOT) has formed a reconciliation committee to meet with Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike.
PDP presidential contender and ex-VP Atiku Abubakar will chair the committee and 13 PDP governors will serve as its members.
Party BOT Chairman Walid Jibril announced Sunday that the visit to Governor Wike would take place shortly after Atiku and PDP National Chairman Iyorchia Ayu return to the nation from their vacations in the United States.
“I have noted with great concern and great sense of feeling on the various recent comments coming from some of our PDP members and some prominent Nigerians on the choice of Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, the Governor of Delta State as the vice-presidential candidate by Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of our Party PDP – the biggest party not only in Nigeria but the whole of Africa,” he said.
With PDP as the strongest and most prominent party in Nigeria today, “all the comments and diverse submissions are extremely common in any political setting in Nigeria today.”
Nigeria’s vice-presidential candidate, Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State, as well as Ayu and other members of the PDP National Working Group would be part of the reconciliatory committee, according to the BOT’s chairman
There are also former PDP officials from across the country, as well as party elders from different regions and states.
Senator Jibrin described Governor Wike as a very responsible and diligent PDP member who played a significant role in the party’s rise to prominence.
Ahead of the meeting with the governor to discuss reconciliation, he issued an appeal to party members in Rivers to refrain from leaving the party and to avoid making comments that would diminish the party.
To ensure Nigeria’s 2023 elections go smoothly, the BOT chairman urged its members and other “respectable and responsible” Nigerians “to give the party their full support, so that it can establish the government by holding all political offices in Nigeria in 2023.”
“We need to unite as our founding fathers had envisioned,” he said. That’s why it’s important to ignore any vitriol meant to sow discord among us. Until we can forgive ourselves, Nigerians will lose faith in us and our party.
“It is my earnest request to all present and former governors and former presidents of Nigeria not to give more fuel to the fire, but to always endeavor to quench the fire from spreading,” he said in a statement. Please let me to say out loud how grateful we are to all of our existing PDP governors for their unfailing support of our party.”
