More trouble for Nwodo •PDP S/East disowns him • Moves to vacate court order

THE South-East zonal committee of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), on  Sunday, passed a vote of no confidence in the national chairman of the party, Dr Okwesilieze Nwodo, and called on him to resign his chairmanship of the ruling party.

The committee made  the call in  a communiqué issued at the end of its one-day meeting in Enugu, condemning, “without reservations, the ignoble conduct of the suspended national chairman of our party, Dr Okwesilieze Nwodo, who, by flagrantly disregarding the party’s constitution, disobeying a valid court order by showing up at the special convention and lying to the convention that the order had been vacated, brought shame and embarrassment to the party and, therefore, us, his kinsmen and women.”

While  apologising  to the country for “this calamitous behaviour of Dr Nwodo in deliberately and wilfully attempting to void the special convention by not only showing up but forcibly taking over the officiating at the convention before he was overpowered and subdued,” the committee urged the  National Executive Committee of the  party to  expel  Dr Nwodo from the party,  if he failed to resign.

“Having reviewed developments within the PDP, especially as they affect the South-East geopolitical zone, the South East Zonal Committee of the party resolved as follows: “To congratulate the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, His Excellency, Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan, on his overwhelming victory as the presidential standard- bearer at the PDP special convention; to restate our overwhelming endorsement of his candidacy and our firm belief that he and the vice-president, His Excellency, Architect Namadi Sambo, possess the experience, education and sufficient knowledge of Nigeria’s problems to be able to pilot the country to the next level of her development.

“That we hereby pass a vote of no confidence on Dr Nwodo and ask him to resign his chairmanship of the party, and that if he fails, the National Executive Committee of our party should expel him from the party,” the communiqué read in part.

The committee appealed  to the members of the  party who had deserted the party, especially National Assembly members and party stalwarts in Oyo, Osun, Plateau, Anambra,  Adamawa and other states, since Dr Nwodo “unleashed his high-handedness on nearly every state chapter of the party, seeking to hand-pick candidates without going through the process of primaries” to return to the party.

It pledged its support to the acting national chairman of the party, Alhaji Mohammed Bello, to run the party pending the emergence of a chairman of “South-East extraction, acceptable to party members within the zone, to finish Dr Nwodo’s remaining period in office.”

Reacting through his special adviser, Ike Abonyi, the national chairman of the PDP, Dr Nwodo said whatever decision “they took in the so-called South-East PDP meeting is of no effect because they have no such power.

“They are just busybodies driven by their own interest. Nwodo could not have undermined a project  he put on the line in the past seven months to achieve, which is having a successful national convention and having President Jonathan come through. Even those political enemies  know that without him, the national convention would not have been a huge success.
May God bless Nigeria and its dangerous politics?”

Meanwhile, indications, however, emerged on Sunday that, Dr  Nwodo had commenced series of moves aimed at vacating the order of the Enugu High Court, which barred him from parading himself as national chairman of the party.

Investigations revealed in Abuja that some influential hands in the capital city had been reached on the way to save the PDP chairman from further legal embarrassment.

It was gathered that  the Chief Justice of the Federation, Justice Alloysius Katsina-Alu, had audience with the Chief Judge of Enugu State on the true situation of things in the Enugu matter.

A court order from the Enugu State high court had stopped Nwodo from parading himself as PDP chairman on Wednesday, less than 24 hours to the PDP national convention.

The order forced the PDP to adopt the party’s Deputy National Chairman, Dr Mohammed, to preside over the national convention that produced Dr Goodluck Jonathan as the party’s presidential candidate for the April polls.

Though Nwodo had surfaced at the convention ground, the uncertainty of the position of things led the party to adopt Mohammed.

But sources said that moves were in progress to ensure that Nwodo secure respite through possible intervention of the Attorney-General of the Federation, Mr Bello Adoke and the Chief Justice of the Federation.

-Tribune

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Posted by admin on Jan 16 2011. Filed under Party Politics, Peoples' Democratic Party (PDP). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry