PDP Crisis: Nyako Amaechi dare Tukur
Busolami Idowu
Adamawa State Governor, Murtala Nyako, and the Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi, have dismissed threat that they may face the Peoples Democratic Party’s disciplinary committee if they fail to honour the October 7, 2013, meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan.
The President met with the aggrieved governors and some party leaders mid September where all parties agreed to continue discussions and refrain from making inflammatory public statements. The meeting also resolved that other issues which had not been concluded would be left for further deliberations at another meeting billed for October 7, 2013.
The ‘rebel’ Governors however said the threats and intimidation could not make them abandon the cause of returning the party to the path of decency.
Reacting to this issue, Nyako said the arm-twisting tactics being employed by the Tukur-led PDP was bound to fail.
This, he said, was because intimidation in situations like this would be counterproductive at the end of the day.
Nyako, who spoke through his Director of Press and Public Relations, Ahmad Sajo, said: “Our position in Adamawa has always been that you cannot negotiate with someone by intimidating him.
“You try to create an understanding but they are not exploiting this option. All I am saying is that, let us wait and see.”
He accused the Tukur-led PDP of behaving as if other options do not exist.
He stated, “They are behaving as if Nigeria is PDP and PDP is Nigeria, that is the impression they want to give.”
When contacted, Kano State Governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, said: “No comments.”
On his part, Amaechi, who spoke through the Chief of Staff, Government House, Port Harcourt, Chief Tony Okocha, said it was better for the PDP to use the carrot rather than the stick approach.
He explained that it was wrong for the party to threaten to discipline the aggrieved governors if they failed to show up at the October 7, 2013 meeting scheduled by President Goodluck Jonathan.
He stated that though the aggrieved governors, including Amaechi, were ready to attend the meeting with the President, they would not be coerced into doing so.
Meanwhile, the Presidency has insisted that the alleged one term agreement claimed to have been entered into by President Goodluck Jonathan only exists in the imagination of Governor Babangida Aliyu of Niger State.
The Special Adviser to the President on Political Matters, Ahmed Gulak, said this in an interview with one of our correspondents in Abuja on Thursday.
He was reacting to a fresh statement credited to the governor where Aliyu said that it was moral to stick to agreement
