PDP won’t miss Amaechi, Wammako, others –Tukur...

CREDIT: PUNCH NIGERIA The Peoples Democratic Party has said it will not miss any of the seven rebel governors, especially five of them who defected to the All Progressives Congress.
The party therefore asked President Goodluck Jonathan not to entertain any fear concerning the party’s future.
The National Chairman of the party, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, said this in Abuja on Tuesday when the executive members of the Sokoto State chapter of the party paid him and members of the PDP National Working Committee a courtesy visit at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja.
There were seven aggrieved governors in the PDP, out of which five had defected to the APC.
The seven governors are Rotimi Amaechi (Rivers); Sule Lamido (Jigawa); Abdulfatah Ahmed (Kwara); Aliyu Wammako (Sokoto); Babangida Aliyu (Niger); Murtala Nyako (Adamawa); and Rabiu Kwankwanso (Kano).
Aliyu and Lamido are yet to defect from the ruling party.
Tukur, who was outside the country when the governors defected had earlier said he was shocked with their defection, but had also said he would not stop anyone from leaving the party.
But while speaking on Monday, Tukur advised President Jonathan not to entertain any fear, saying that Sokoto State chapter of the party was solidly behind him.
He said he was sure that the defecting rebel governors would come back to the PDP.
Tukur said, “Goodluck Jonathan, no fear. Sokoto is behind you. When the Caliphate is behind you, believe me no fear. No fear, no shaking, PDP is our party, it’s a party of choice.
“People can defect, it’s their right, but soon they will found out that it is not cool in the place they are going. They will soon come to the embrace of the PDP.
“Sometimes when people have eaten and are satisfied, you know what they will do? They will tell themselves let’s try another place to see whether there is a better food.
“We experienced it before, it’s not new. Many of them left PDP before, it’s not new, but my advice is that people should not forget that no matter what they do, if they want to sit, they should learn to sit on their bottom.
“They know that there is no other way, PDP is the party, if they go… they have done so before and we saw them coming back.
“If they believe they want to go they will not be missed, we cannot miss them. They enter a wrong party and when they take the wrong party, they will end up in wrong places.”
He said he was sure that the party remained inclusive and promised his guests that the party would accord everyone of them respect.
In his speech, the leader of the delegation, who was a former Minister of Communications, Alhaji Arzika Tambuwal, urged the NWC members to immediately constitute a caretaker committee to organise congresses for the election of new party executives at all levels in Sokoto State.
He said members of the party in the state had observed recent political developments in the country and what he described as the over heating of the polity.
This, he said, was created by the PDP aggrieved governors.
He said, “In the last six years, he (Wammako) victimised most loyal PDP members he met in the party, managed the party like a one man sole proprietorship, and looked upon the national party headquarters with disdain. His recent defection is therefore not surprising.”
In his reaction, the National Publicity Secretary of the New PDP, Chief Chukwuemeka Eze, asked members of the PDP to hold Tukur responsible for the expected crashing of the ruling party.
He said, “Tukur should be held responsible if the PDP eventually sinks. Don’t forget that it was because of people like him that we abandoned the party’s sinking ship.
“President Jonathan is not helping anyone, including himself, by keeping Tukur as the national chairman of the party. Anyway, their doomsday is near.”