• Party refutes rumoured apathy by Bode George
The ongoing reconciliation moves in the Lagos State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), received a boost over the weekend when party leaders across the 20 local governments and 37 Local Council Development Areas (LCDA) passed a vote of confidence in the Chairman, Moshood El-Salvador.
The members comprising representatives of the Hausa, Southeast and South-South communities among others, promised to abide by the PDP Constitution and every directive from the party’s National Headquarters in the ongoing repositioning ahead of the 2019 general elections.
Passing the vote of confidence on Salvador at the party’s secretariat in Lagos, the leader of the PDP local council chairmen, Sunday Olaifa said it is imperative of Lagos PDP members to support and encourage the state’s chairman in his determination and cooperation with the national body, particularly the National Chairman of the party, Uche Secondus to reposition the chapter before the next governorship election.
The PDP chairman of Oshodi/Isolo LCDA said since it has been identified, proven and manifested that disunity had always been the factor depriving the PDP the governorship victory in the state since 1999 “we should tackle the crisis headlong and solve it once and for all, hence our decision to support Secondus and Salvador and other leaders of the PDP to reposition and make it stronger ahead of the next general elections.”
Meanwhile, one of the factors that necessitated the vote of confidence in the Salvador-led executive was the discovery that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) is allegedly sponsoring some dissident members of the PDP to destabilize the ongoing reconciliation efforts.
To buttress the discovery, Salvador disclosed that some unscrupulous and acclaimed PDP members impersonated the party’s local government chairmen in Amuwo Odofin, Agege and mostly in places where the party won in the 2015 House of Representatives and House of Assembly elections.
The state chairman noted that the motive behind the impersonation was to divide the ranks of our party in our strong locations ahead of the next general election.
According to him, “The tactics applied by these dissident members was that they called unauthorised meetings and started saying what was contradictory to the directives we received from the national headquarters on the sharing formula and reconciliation agreements.”
Salvador however sounded a strong note of warning that any member of the party founding erring or acting contrary to its constitution would be dealt with accordingly, reiterating, “If we must win there must be discipline.”
Relevance of Bode George to Lagos PDP
The meeting also deliberated on the continuous relevance of the erstwhile Deputy National Chairman, Chief Olabode George to the Lagos chapter, as it dismissed as complete falsehood and rumour, that the Salvador-led executive in collaboration with the national executive, is sidelining George and his loyalists after the December 9 National Convention.
George was one of the Southwest contestants for the PDP’s national chairman position during the convention. It was insinuated that some forces within the party deliberately deprived the region from producing the chairman, which led to his (George) and other Southwest stakeholders’ apathy to the party’s affairs after the convention.
Speaking on the development, Dipo Olorunrinu, the lawmaker representing Amowu-Odofin Constituency 1 at the Lagos State House of Assembly, said some elements hired by the ruling APC are working against the PDP, saying it is better to fish those characters out on time and place them where they belong now before jeopardising our efforts ahead of 2019.
Describing those elements as timewasters he pleaded with to leave the party, Olorunrinu said, “These people are on contract to frustrate our efforts and one of their agenda was to continue to spread the news of non-existing discord between state’s executive and some leaders of the party.”
According to him, “The APC has demonstrated enough determination and desperation to win the next governorship election and one of its strategies is to ensure that our party did not grow. The ruling party is also doing everything to undermine the leadership of our party with the aim to causing confusion among us but the onus is on us to resist them.”
To clarify the doubt about the relationship between George and the party, the lawmaker said, “It was on the instructions of the former deputy national chairman that we are working with Mr. Salvador for the progress of our party. It is therefore an absolute rumour that Chief George is no more with us and as it is today, Mr. Salvador remains the authentic chairman of Lagos PDP.”
Meanwhile, the strength of the Salvador-led executive is its ability to gather all the leaders of the PDP who have in the past abandoned the party for one reason or the other, while it has continued to appeal to others to return to base for them to collectively take over Lagos from the APC in 2019.
