Amidst the crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) over the demand for resignation of its National Chairman, Dr Iyorchia Ayu, the South-West Forum of PDP Stakeholders for Justice, has said Ayu can become a hero if he voluntarily resigns.
Quest Times has previously reported that the party’s crisis started after the emergence of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar as PDP Presidential Candidate in May.
Since Atiku’s emergence, some governors and party leaders have demanded more equitable zoning arrangement from the party hierarchy and more inclusion of the party’s southern caucus in key decision making.
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Governor of Rivers state, Nyesom Wike and his Oyo state counterpart, Seyi Makinde, have been at the forefront of the demand for Ayu’s resignation to usher in a chairman from Southern extraction.
In a statement jointly signed by the Coordinators of the forum, Messrs Banji Okunomo and Gani Taofik in Lagos on Thursday, the group threw its weight behind the calls for the resignation of the party chairman.
According to it, the resignation of the chairman is the only panacea for peace in the party.
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“We, the above-named forum of the PDP, wishes to affirm our support for the position being canvassed by Makinde, corroborated by the doggedness of the ‘Wikes’ and the wisdom of the ‘Bode Georges’, as a lasting panacea for peace and eventual victory of our party at the 2023 presidential election,” the group said.
The forum said that Ayu should be able to sacrifice for Atiku to win the next election.
“It is our take, that Ayu should indeed go further to logically and wisely conclude the process that will guarantee the emergence of Abubakar as the next president of Nigeria, by making other possible sacrifices necessary to achieve that goal.
“Indeed, this is why and when Ayu himself will be more celebrated as PDP’s hero of democracy rather than clogging the party’s wheel of progress and creating avoidable crisis for the party,” the group said.
Wike’s group have said they have withdrawn their participation in the PDP Presidential Campaign Council till their demands are met.