By Eric Elezuo

This is not the best of times for once upon a time Africa’s largest political party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the party continues to wobble in the internal crises that have engulfed its rank and file before, during and after its May 2022 presidential primaries at the MKO Abiola Stadium in Abuja. Of course, the crises culminated in the loss of the presidential race to eventually winners, the All Progressives Congress (APC), represented by President Bola Tinubu. And like an infected wound, the crises have refused to fizzle out 16 months after the Tinubu administration assumed office. Popular opinion have erroneously assumed that the party would have picked itself up at this time, restrategise and poise for the 2027 onslaught considering the dismal, clueless and epileptic performance of the present Tinubu government.

But the situation is far from expectation. Accusing fingers have continued to point from one corner to another from party members, creating an atmosphere where recovery, even to status quo, remains a bleak hope.

This situation has prompted one of the party chieftains, a former Kogi West representative in the Senate, Senator Dino Melaye, to add salt to their injury by launching another scathing attack on the party.

Melaye, penultimate week, dismissed the party as a dead bunch, saying that its obituary has already been announced. He reckoned that the founding fathers of the party like Alex Ekwueme, Solomon Lar, Sunday Awoniyi, Adamu Chiroma, Tony Anenih and Abubakar Rimi among others would be turning in their graves over the present status of the party, especially with the position and mechanisms of administration attributed to its present acting National Chairman, Iliya Damagum. He believes that Damagum has no interest of the party at heart, but was out to kill it according to script prepared by the former governor of Rivers State, who is now the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Mr. Nyesom Wike, serving in an APC government.

He noted that the former ruling party is now an obituary under the leadership of Damagum, Samuel Anyanwu, and Umar Bature.

Melaye accused Damagum, Anyanwu, and Bature of destroying the former ruling party, which held sway for 16 uninterrupted years, irredeemably. He said the high profile PDP chieftains are guilty of commercialising and privatising the supposed main opposition party.

Melaye took to his X account to remark that “PDP is the only surviving party of the 4th Republic. After 27 years of surviving all shenanigans.

“Alex Ekwueme, Solomon Lar, Sunday Awoniyi, Adamu Chiroma, Tony Anenih, Abubakar Rimi, etc will be turning in their graves seeing what Damagun, Anyanwu and Bature are doing to the dream of building a national party. PDP now, Obituary.”

It will be recalled that Melaye was the Chief agent for the party’s presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, in the 2023 election, and stood stoutly against alleged manipulation of votes by the Yakubu Mahmood-led Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). He led a walkout of both the PDP and Labour Party, when they felt INEC was not ready to listen to their complaints.

Melaye’s outburst has necessitated a debate that seeks to find out if the party once assumed to be so strong to be in power for 60 uninterrupted years is truly dead.

In a sharp response however, a cross section of stakeholders of the Party, under the aegis of PDP Frontliners, berated Melaye, who flew the party’s flag in the last Kogi State governorship election, for bringing the party into disrepute with unjustifiable verbal attacks on its leadership.

They described Melaye’s assertions that the party under Damagum’s leadership has become “commercialised and privatised” as discourteous.

In a statement that contained the reaction, and signed by the Group’s president, Alhaji Hussein Mohammed, the secretary, Mr. Moses Abidemi, and the Publicity Secretary, Mr. Dan Okafor, the group alleged that ‘vultures of different hues’ within and outside the party are now circling around, hoping to see the death of a sick PDP and make quick gains while vowing to sustain resistance.

They pledged to join forces with other progressive members to fight in order to ensure that such ugly expectations and the people behind them do not succeed.

“These are strange times for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), its Kogi state· governorship candidate in the last elections who got huge resources but woefully failed to do any serious political mobilisation; now has the guts to come· out and say that the party is being destroyed by the exact officials who facilitated his governorship ticket and prevailed on others to step down.

“Many who benefited generously from PDP are now among the party’s biggest headaches, Dino Melaye got PDP ticket to the House of Representatives, and even after returning from the APC, the PDP gave him a senatorial ticket after prevailing on other qualified aspirants to step down, but you can all see the baseless and groundless insult he is using to pay back,” the statement read in part.

The group said it was gratuitous insult to the people of Kogi State and the PDP for Senator Melaye to overlook his own long-known shortcomings and now unfairly accuse the party’s acting National Chairman, Umar Iliya Damagum, National Secretary, Senator Samuel Anyanwu, and National Organising Secretary, Umar Bature, of being behind the bad fortunes of the party.

The group further said, “For last year’s Kogi state governorship elections, Dino Melaye got huge contributions, including vehicles from PDP stakeholders, but never dispensed campaign funds to party structures or even, PDP polling agents across Kogi state; it has never been so bad since 1999, but Dino Melaye’s failure earned PDP a meagre 46,000 votes across the entire state and the governorship candidate himself did not even bother to vote!

“Audaciously, this Melaye took to X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, and wrote, “End of the road for PDP as Damagun, Bature, and Anyanwu irredeemably destroyed the party. We will talk about the commercialisation and privatisation of PDP. PDP is now once upon a time.

“Ironically, this fellow now talking about how our party is dying was implicated in efforts to scuttle the PDP ward congress in Kogi state, in an abortive effort to commercialize and ‘deliver’ to a paymaster for a desperate outing in 2027; members suspect an on-going agenda to even scam Kogi state PDP once again.

“The misplaced anger against Damagum and the PDP leadership began when they agreed to the August 9 call of our group and that of eighteen out of the twenty-one PDP chairmen in various local government areas of Kogi state to stop the state’s Caretaker Committee from replacing the results of a free, fair and orderly ad-hoc delegates’ conference of Saturday, 27th July, 2024 with a manipulated process hurriedly slated for Saturday, August 10 but cancelled by the national leadership.

“Obviously, someone is looking for how to scam us and commercialize PDP support base in Kogi state; or, is it not a strange irony that the same minority clique that was behind the failed attempt to commercialize and privatize Kogi state PDP ahead of 2027 primaries now audaciously throws such accusation against those who stopped the manipulation so decisively”

The party stakeholders expressed optimism that, with appropriate steps being taken, the PDP will rise above its crisis and re-emerge as the party of choice not only in Kogi State but also across Nigeria.

Stakeholders have said that the most interesting part of the PDP imbroglio is the fact all those involved agree that the party is in squabbles, but no one agrees that he is responsible for the mess the party is experiencing. It is believed that the party is divided between supporters of the FCT minister, Wike and the supporters of its former presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.

It would be recalled that the emergence of Atiku as the presidential candidate in 2022, erupted a chain reaction in the party, which led to the breakaway of five governors including Seyi Makinde of Oyo State, Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State, Samuel Ortom of Benue State and Nyesom Wike of Rivers State. All governors withdrew their support for the party and the candidate, saying that they won’t support a candidate from the north. PDP lost the election. But the battle returns to who controls its machinery after the lost.

With Wike fighting against the party from all fronts including joining the opposition government without technically joining the opposition party, the scenario took a position of the government in power against the opposition, and creating an impression that there is a grand design to exterminate or kill the party in the face of the approaching 2027 general election.

“This is what Dino Melaye is complaining about. He is not saying that PDP is dying. He said categorically that PDP is dead. This is not farfetched because the forces controlling the PDP at the national level are technically no longer members of the PDP because they are machineries controlled by the ruling party if we consider the fact that Wike in whose camp they all are, is an appendage of the Tinubu administration.

“How do you expect Wike to act against the government he is feeding from? Will he for any reason go against Tinubu, whose on your mandate anthem, he publicly sings? The possibility is far from possible. Wike is just an audacious mole, who is bold enough not to hide his identity in a bid to dare whosoever dares to dare him. It’s obvious the Damagum-led executive council is dancing to the Abuja landlord’s tune,” a PDP stakeholder told The Boss.

But Wike, who has not hidden his averse for anyone calling for his suspension, has continued to dare his PDP colleagues, threatening fire and brimstone. Recently, in an outburst, he vowed to fight anyone who plans to take over his structure in Rivers State, saying he would cause a political crisis in their states if any PDP governor tried interfering in the party’s affairs in the South-South state.

The PDP governors, who had met in Taraba State on August 23, weighed in on the crisis rocking the party in the state and reiterated their support for Governor Siminalayi Fubara.

The PDP governors’ forum, in a communique read by its Chairman and Bauchi State Governor, Bala Mohammed, called for a review of the party congress outcome to restore Fubara’s leadership role in the state.

Speaking at the PDP Secretariat in Port Harcourt on Saturday during the party’s state congress, Wike urged the PDP governors to stay clear of the party’s affairs in Rivers.

“Let me assure all of you, not while we live will anybody take away the structure of PDP from us. But let me tell people, I hear some governors who say they will take over the structure and give back to somebody.

“I pity those governors because I will put fire in their states. When God has given you peace, you say you don’t want peace anything you see you take.

“Because I heard they got some money from a signature bonus, and so their heads are getting big that you will put a hand in my state. Prepare because I can also do the same thing in your state.

“Whether you are from Bauchi, I don’t give a damn, whichever state you are from, as far as I know, that you are trying to put yourself in Rivers State, your hand will get burnt, and you will never sleep in your state.”

The Rivers PDP has been in crisis following the fallout between Wike and his predecessor, who was absent at the congress.

A PDP stalwart and former Director of Strategy, Nwazuruahu Shield, while speaking on Arise News, maintained that the PDP leadership appears like a stooge of Wike, and has remained aloof in the midst of the shenanigans of the FCT minister. He stressed that the leadership of the PDP should be the ones to intervene in the Rivers PDP crisis, not the governors, but the Damagum NEC is not ready to offend their paymaster.

Lending his voice to the crises, a Deputy National Chairman of the PDP, Chief Bode George, sues for peace, asking all gladiators to sheath their swords, and give peace a chance, owning that political crisis is nothing new in political parties.

Making a veiled reference to Atiku, he advised against being too ambitious, adding that when one gets to certain age and class, the best thing to do would be to handover to younger generations.

“There is a new concept now in politics called President Joe Biden political strategy, when you get to a certain age and a certain class, you handover to the younger generation to continue because of your country. No individual can be larger or bigger than a nation and if you have that as your concept, nobody can be in power forever.”

He highlighted that the party’s survival is hinged on sacrifice and ability of leaders to adhere to the constitution, adding that the Reconciliation Committee set up by the party is of no use if there’s no conscious effort to approach the crises from the root cause. He insisted that Atiku has no reason to have contested the 2023 election because there was no way a northerner could have replace Muhammadu Buhari, another northerner, who had just done eight years.

He further advised Atiku in the interest of peace and equity to jettison any intention to contest in 2027, and instead support a southerner to slug it out with Tinubu in 2027, stressing that if Atiku is still desirous of vying for the presidency, he should exercise patience till 2031, when it would be the turn of the north again.

In the same vein, another PDP chieftain, and former governor of Zamfara State, Sule Lamido, while speaking to Nigerian Tribune in an interview dissected the intricacies of the PDP crises, holding Wike accountable to the unending array of skirmishes that had held the party hostage to Progress.

The interview is replicated in full:

Nigerians regard the PDP as the main opposition party but the party is embroiled in intractable crises. As one of the people who birthed the party, how are you dealing with the problem?

Why pick on the PDP in isolation from the Nigerian factor? PDP is an institution run by the Nigerian people. So, why do you think the PDP would be run differently? Tell me one institution that is working well in Nigeria today. So, why treat the PDP in isolation?

It is a Nigerian thing; whatever is happening in the PDP is happening everywhere else, in government institutions, even in newspaper organisations, wherever you see Nigerians. So, the PDP is a Nigerian phenomenon and run by the Nigerian people, not by angels from heaven and, therefore, it is the same spirit whether in the APC or the PDP. Even if you go the APC, the people you find there are all PDP. So, let us look at it holistically. It has to do with the Nigerian spirit: our attitude, our behaviour, our culture as a people. Are we disciplined? As a people, are we patriotic? Are we patient? Are we tolerant? So long as we lack discipline or patience, or tolerance or adherence to the rule of law, there will be crisis, whether in PDP or APC.

APC is there today because it has the capacity to make noise. Ask Salihu Lukman, former National Vice Chairman, (North West) of the APC, about the party. So, the PDP is just a reflection of the attitude of Nigerians, the character of Nigerians as a people. The question is, are the Nigerian people willing and ready to salvage the country? Is it about me or about us? So, if it is about me alone, what do you expect?

The people look up to the PDP as an alternative to the APC but the party has kept losing elections. What is the way forward?

You are still taking about the mood of the moment. You didn’t reflect on the past. You must look back and ask what is the source of the problem. If you see a raging fire, you must identify the source to be able to control the smoke. You are simply talking about the symptoms, you are not looking at the bigger picture. When you say PDP, in 1998 when it was formed, the main focus was to restore unity in Nigeria, to restore people’s confidence which was undermined by June 12 (1993 presidential election annulment) and a section of the country felt cheated and lost the sense of belonging. After the PDP came to power, the country was stabilised, as against the (previous) feeling of distrust. Chief Olusegun Obasanjo from the South West emerged as the president even though they never liked him in his region.

What is happening now is that we failed to build on that stability. Unfortunately, today, we are only reacting to the consequences of our own actions. Look at this government, all the governors, the majority of the lawmakers are PDP, only a few are from the Lagos axis but the majority of them are PDP. Even the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) in Tinubu’s administration – George Akume – was in PDP. (President Bola) Tinubu, (Vice President Kashim) Shettima, the SGF are former governors, former senators, up to the Senate President. Isn’t there a better team with a lot of experience to solve Nigeria’s problem than this team?

The narrative out there is that some of you are helpless and you have conceded the political space in the PDP to the likes of Nyesom Wike. Is that the true situation?

Wike is our creation, we made him. Where was Wike in 1999? Somebody who was your own invention, whom you thought you could develop, groom as a future leader now tells you that he is his own person now, what do you do? To me, Wike is not a factor. If Tinubu is not tolerating him, who is Wike? So, Wike is there today because the environment is there for him to manipulate and exploit. Simple.   We are putting political expediency over national interest. Wike is being hyped by Tinubu to destroy the PDP but destroying the PDP also means destroying Tinubu.

What does Tinubu stand to lose if the PDP is destroyed? Nigerians are saying Wike was actually planted to undermine the PDP. Is that arrangement not to Tinubu’s advantage ahead of 2027?

No, Wike wasn’t planted. He is PDP. Are you saying it was Tinubu who made him Special Adviser to (former Rivers State governor,) Peter Odili or Chief of Staff to (former Governor Rotimi) Amaechi? Are you saying it was Tinubu who made him governor of Rivers State? No, Wike was never planted. He is PDP but then that is the Nigerian character that we have been talking about. But ultimately, he will become a political orphan to Tinubu and both of them are going to lose because the entire arrangement is unholy; it is immoral, it is un-Nigerian. This issue of betrayal, undermining your party isn’t part of our culture. No matter how long he serves Tinubu, ultimately, both of them are going to lose because the country is losing. So, Wike was never planted. He was simply identified, he is a willing character who lacks the morality and the good character and honour not to disown his own party. He has mortgaged his own party.

Considering all of this, how does the PDP plan on winning the next general election?

It is a huge challenge. Are the Nigerian people willing? The issues of insecurity, of the economy, of poverty are all there. It is not about the PDP, what is the opinion of the Nigerian people? People have been hired to destroy the PDP but we are making every effort, because right now, we have people who are anti-PDP. Imagine people like Ortom (former Benue State governor) saying ‘our leader, Wike, has said we will vote Tinubu in 2027’. Imagine someone in the PDP saying he is going to take a cue from Wike to vote Tinubu in 2027. People who are in the PDP are also working for the APC and Tinubu. So, it is a very difficult thing. We are working hard to find people who share a similar concern because those in the party who are now in government are not on the same frequency with us.

If you have those in government who share same frequency with us, we can confidently say yes, but it depends on who you can you identify and we are doing that. We are working hard, but it is a huge task. It is going to be difficult with Tinubu, with his hold on the country, on the economy, and his audacity to say this is where I stand against Nigeria’s interest. It is something else. Tinubu is very daring; he is his own creation, he is a self-made man, right from Chicago, what he went through on the streets. Look at how he was able to fight the Alliance for Democracy and Afenifere and then Obasanjo. At the APC convention, Buhari was against him but he defeated Buhari. What are you talking about? Don’t underestimate a man like that. Look at how he made it in life. He confronted all obstacles to get to where he is today, at the apex. There is no Nigerian like Tinubu who has been there on his own. Every established political arrangement, every institution, he demolished them. Now that he is in charge, he is not going to be easy to deal with. With Tinubu, Nigeria is a fiefdom, Tinubu is the emperor. And if you watch him closely, he doesn’t care.

He paid the governors at the convention. Prior to the convention, he was in Abeokuta, Ogun State, where he boasted that it was his turn to rule Nigeria. And Buhari, very naive, was watching. He never liked Tinubu. There was somebody he wanted. He didn’t even trust his own vice president, Professor (Yemi) Osinbajo; he wanted Ahmed Lawan, but his calculation was absurd. You have done eight years for the North and you wanted another Northerner for another eight years?! No. Maybe later but there are some dynamics which you can’t alter, not in Nigeria of today.

The president of Nigeria, after being in office for eight years, lacked the courage to push through his anointed choice. He was there at the convention and Tinubu that he never liked, he never believed in emerged. Tinubu knows that his victory wasn’t from Buhari, therefore,  he owes him nothing. He wasn’t the choice of Afenifere, Obasanjo never liked him, but he became president. All the other groups, including the governors, were there but he won. He was determined to demolish all obstacles and he crushed them.

Has the PDP conceded that Tinubu is unstoppable in 2027?

No. You see, the domestic cat fed on small chickens, but one day, the mother of the chickens stood up to the cat. Tinubu is that cat. What I am saying is that even Pharaoh’s empire collapsed. So, no matter how daring you are, ultimately, it won’t end well. So, Tinubu today is somebody who has a grip on Nigeria, who owes obeisance to nobody in Nigeria, who believes that God made him and he made himself and he is now lording it over the Nigerian people and nobody can challenge him. He was adept at studying the system, manipulating it. He exploited it and he did it well. I wish he could use his sagacity, his talent to help Nigeria’s development. It would have been wonderful. But he is using it negatively. He has everything but not for the development of Nigeria and it is affecting you, it is affecting me.

Speculations are rife that the bigwigs who lost out in the APC and the PDP are discussing an alternative platform. Are you involved in the discussion?

You see, I am coming from the old order and I am very, very conservative and I have a leg in history. Today, if you mention Obafemi Awolowo or Nnamdi Azikiwe to this new generation, they get confused. They will tell you they don’t know them, they aren’t conversant with history and couldn’t have acquired their values.

If you ask me that question, you are simply reacting to the current event. Those who formed the APC, tell me their shared ideology. Tell me what Atiku, Saraki shared with Tinubu ideologically. Tell me what Amaechi, Murtala Nyako, Aliyu Wammako have in common with Buhari? People in the PDP who walked into the APC, tell me what they have in common with either Tinubu or Buhari. Nothing but desperation to grab power. The whole thing is failing because the purpose wasn’t governance but to gain political power to their own advantage.

So, if today we are trying to react because of the failure of government, it means our reaction is not sincere; it is not genuine. However, if we have to forge (an alliance), fine. But what do we have in common? If we are going to do any alliance, we must put Nigeria first. If we share common commitment, national interest, yes, we can forge an alliance. It must be driven by some moral forces but if the entire desire is just to grab power, no moral principle, it will end up like the APC. Whatever alliance forged must be about Nigeria first. I won’t be part of any special purpose vehicle that will abandon Nigeria. I want something that will arise from genuine and sincere concern about Nigeria first. That should be our rallying point.

What is your assessment of Tinubu’s administration after more than one year in office?

Morally speaking, I was in government, my party was in government and then the APC came to Nigerians and was demonising the PDP and then pushed us out of government. Now that you are asking me to assess this administration, how do you think Nigerians will see my judgment? You see, we should be objective. I was in government, we were removed and they took over and you asking me to assess them. I don’t think it is fair for me to do that. I am in the party that lost to Tinubu. No matter what I say now, it won’t be viewed as fair on Tinubu.

There were speculations that you were offered the chairmanship of the PDP but you turned down the offer. Why?

Who gave me the offer?

Some of the people itching to leave the PDP reportedly approached you and promised to stay back if you would accept to lead the party. Why did you turn down the offer?

I know some people in the PDP who can’t stand Sule; they can’t stand me, no matter what. There is also peer envy today in Nigeria. What I want you to know is that if I go there, I will go with my own kind of baggage. My baggage is what some people stand to hate. But I preferred David Mark because it (the PDP chairmanship) was zoned to the North Central and to me, it is about maturity, consistency, exposure, experience, humility, commitment to the job. David Mark was my choice. I would have loved him to be there because as chairman, he could command respect across the blocs. The governors would not see him as somebody they could challenge. That office needs someone with capacity, skill. He could work with the governors and they would defer to him and vice versa. The other elements in the PDP would also support him and work with him.

I know that I am very, very temperamental. I may not be the best candidate because in times of crisis, you are looking for somebody who can be calm and tactical. Based on the zoning arrangement, the best person would have been David Mark.

So, why did he also decline?

I don’t know. He must have his reasons. I appealed to him to make the sacrifice and we would be there for him, but he told me, ‘Sule, I know my worries and my fears’. I also knew my worries and I refused. But again, it was never zoned to my zone in the first instance. Even if you put me there, I have my own baggage in terms of character and ways of doing things. I can be intolerant. I can be rude, unintentionally.

THE WAY FORWARD

Various stakeholders, who claimed to have the interest of PDP’s recovery at heart, have said that the best way to return to normalcy and give the party a chance to contest the next general election, is to muster the courage to call Wike’s bluff, take him up headlong by whatever means including expelling him from the party.

They maintained that Wike, who has publicly declared that he would be supporting the APC in 2027, is a threat to the party with his continued membership.

“The party must muster the courage to do away with Wike, otherwise, the party will finally collapse irredeemably as Melaye has said. If this is not done, there’s a tendency y that a Resurrection of the then New Peoples Democratic Party (nPDP) as experience in the building up to the 2015 general election, which saw Dr. Goodluck Jonathan and the PDP out of power,” a PDP stakeholder confided in The Boss.

He maintained that with the discomfort in most opposition parties, and also with some aggrieved members of the APC, it is obvious that a possible merger is in the offing; a move that may eventually sound the death knell on the ailing PDP.

Nobody expects President Tinubu to intervene in the PDP crises as it is an internal party affair. In fact, the president and his party are eventually seen as the sole beneficiaries of the unending crises, prompting a cross section of Nigerians to conclude that whatever ailment the PDP is suffering today is a direct consequence of the APC’s political maneuvers in readiness to retain power in 2027, using Wike as a destructive pawn in the all ambitious game of throne.

But is PDP dead? Time will certainly tell.