From: Diana Okon-Effiong, CalabarSome political Leaders and clerics in the South South have expressed anxiety and doubts over President Goodluck Jonathan chances in 2015 elections, saying that there are possibilities that opposing political parties like the All Peoples’ Congress (APC) can defeat PDP at the polls.
They were reacting to current crisis in the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) in the South South and recent newspaper reports by Governor Rotimi Ameachi that President Goodluck Jonathan will lose 2015 due to crisis in the PDP’s South South states.
According to them all is not well with the party and we suspect a fifth columnists within working for the interest of the opposition for Jonathan to fail in 2015”.
This powerful cabal in the party, according to the leaders and clerics had been at work since the Rivers State crisis that saw governor Rotimi Amechi decamping to the APC, the emergence of Aminnu Tambuwal as Speaker House of Representative against the choice of the party and now their fingers are everywhere in the just concluded PDP primaries that is sullied with crisis in the South South and few other places in South East.
They alleged that this powerful group is working in connivance with some South South governors to perfect the plan hence the desperate effort by them to install everybody by all means thereby weeding out the president’s men systematically ahead of 2015.
One of the political Leaders in the state and Legal Practitioner, Chief Utum Eteng and a respected religious leader in Cross River state, His Holiness Olumba Olumba Obu have warned that the PDP in the country may lose 2015 general elections if it does not restrain itself from politics of imposition and arrogance.
Eteng said, “the presidency should be weary of the crisis in his zone whereas other zones in the country are calm and intact. The plot is to ensure he loses or votes are split significantly in his zone by the opposition party that is poised to sweep other zones. Jonathan should stamp his feet on the ground and shine his eyes on who the party finally submits to fly the party flag in the 2015 State and National Assemblies and the Governorship elections. The governors may disappoint him”.
According to him, “the governors in the South South are the ones who are engineering the entire crisis in the South South. It has never been so. The crisis in PDP is unprecedented. I have said it loud and clear that from what the governors are doing it seems to me that some of them are agents APC trying to distort and disorganize the South South so that APC can coast on some of the areas otherwise they will not be operating as if they are emperors treating PDP members with hard fist just because the party structures are in their hands.
“I want to say that it is correct that some persons are paid to destabilize the PDP in the South South. For instance if the president had 500,000 votes in 2011, there is no magic that will bring him near that with the crisis in PDP now except he is able to call an in-house meeting of the governors and stakeholders and they speak sincerely. I believe up till now the governors of the South South are not sincere to the president no matter how they pretend outwardly, they are not.
“Some of these governors were part of the formation of the APC and I have never pretended about that. I say it without any fear of contradiction. Under this circumstance the president should show that he is in charge. Why are the governors interested in determining every body’s fate in the party from the state assembly to the presidency? The president has not in anywhere shown that he is in charge of anything. He has to show that those who stake their lives for him are protected. The governors are not ready to protect such persons, so how do we expect those people to stake their neck and their political ambition in protecting him”.
Eteng charged the president “to act as the leader of the party and the Commander in Chief if he wants to check exodus of popular top PDP members to opposition parties. If he does not, I can still say painfully that Buhari will win him”.
On his part, Obu in a divine service in Calabar said “it is possible for another party to displace the ruling party from the presidency of Nigeria if the PDP and its governors do not also restrain themselves from wanton abuse of political processes and imposition of candidates”.
Although the religious leader who has teeming followership in African and Western countries did not specify which party could out-place the PDP, but said, “God hates arrogance, pride and suppression which are noticeable traits of PDP the party. It is possible for another party to clinch the presidency in Nigeria if the PDP does not stop to abuse political processes. It is not a birthright”.
He warned governors and other political stakeholders to conduct themselves properly with the fear of God otherwise many of them may be disgraced if they did not restrain from their negative behaviours and conducts.
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