Thisday learned yesterday that there was no consensus among the governors, despite media reports that Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike and his fellow governors in the Integrity group had reached a consensus on which presidential candidate they would support.
Wike reportedly angrily left his colleagues in London and headed for Madrid, Spain, in response to disagreements among the G-5 governors, who also include Seyi Makinde of Oyo State, Samuel Ortom of Benue State, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State, and Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State.
More importantly, the party’s threat to expel them if they endorse anyone other than Atiku for president may have given the recalcitrant group pause. Candidates for senatorial seats and the Oyo State governor, both of whom are running for re-election, will no longer be candidates for the party in the upcoming elections if they are kicked out of the party. Since, there is no arrangement for autonomous up-and-comer in the appointive framework.
All candidates for positions based on the PDP platform will cease to be candidates if the party implements its threat to expel them. Additionally, if they decide to participate in the elections, their adversaries will be able to easily challenge their participation in court.
The party will inform INEC via letter that it does not have a candidate for those positions following the expulsion, effectively sweeping them under the rug.
The G-5 governors were said by the media to have agreed to name a presidential candidate on January 5, 2023, but the facts showed the opposite.
However, thisday checks revealed that the governors were unable to reach a consensus on which presidential candidate to support in the February 25 election due to their diverse political interests.
According to a reliable source who spoke with THISDAY, it is true that Makinde and Wike agree that they should back Bola Tinubu, the APC’s presidential candidate; Because they favored a different candidate, Ikpeazu and Ortom diverged.
This was probably a result of the earlier agreement that Makinde and Tinubu should support each other’s goals in the upcoming elections, according to reliable sources.
Makinde agreed to support Tinubu’s presidential ambition in exchange for Tinubu’s support for Makinde’s re-election.
According to a source who spoke with THISDAY, Makinde got Wike to agree to the deal, but other G-5 governors who wanted to run for senator were reluctant to go with Tinubu because of their interest in running for senator.
Makinde’s main complaint was that he was replaced as the PDP presidential Council leader in the South-West by Osun State governor Ademola Adekeke, a position he had previously rejected.
While Wike has no immediate political interest outside of his associates in Rivers state, Ortom, Ikpeazu, and Ugwuanyi are running for senator in their respective states.
Wike was told by Ortom and Ikpeazu as part of their disagreement that it was better for them to remain neutral because openly supporting any other presidential candidate could spell their demise.
Even more, Ortom suggested that they convince National Chairman Iyorcha Ayu to sign a promise to resign after the presidential election, regardless of whether the PDP wins or loses.
The source claims that this is the reason Wike left London enraged for Madrid, Spain, on Saturday to attend the start of the Spanish league.
Yesterday, a group known as the “Restructuring Campaign” tweeted about the issue, revealing that: In London, the G5 disagree. Ikpeazu and Ortom advise Wike to remain neutral because supporting any candidate other than their party’s candidate will bring them down in the PDP. “Wike has even abandoned them in London in anger for Madrid to watch Real Madrid’s opening League match,” Ortom suggests that they permit Ayu to resign immediately following the election’s outcome. The center cannot hold any longer.
Yesterday, THISDAY reported that the PDP was looking into the possibility of expelling members of the G-5 Governors if they decided to support a presidential candidate other than Atiku.
A dependable source, who is an individual from the PDP Official Mission Board, who revealed this to THISDAY, had said one more measure being viewed as by the initiative of the fundamental resistance was the disintegration of the party structures in the separate conditions of the G-5 lead representatives and lay out overseer panels to run the undertakings of the party in the five states.
The anonymous source said that taking such a step would also hurt Makinde’s political ambitions, who is running for governor again, as well as those of Okezie, Ortom, and Ikpeazu, who are all running for senatorial seats in their states.
The source went on to say that “dissolving the party structure will also affect their loyalists who are running for different positions under the PDP in Abia, Rivers, Oyo, Benue, and Enugu.”
On Monday, the governors who were elected on the PDP platform went to the United Kingdom for a second strategic meeting in what many people characterized as yet another jamboree.
Governors led by Wike have been demanding that the PDP’s National Chairman, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, resign as a minimum requirement for the party’s peace and their participation in the presidential campaign council of the party’s candidate for president, Atiku. In good faith, Wike has refused to accept his defeat in the party’s presidential primary.
Wike has mobilized four additional governors to create a crisis within the party since he lost the primary and even the vice presidential nomination.
Since Wike failed to secure the position of Atiku Abubakar’s vice presidential running mate, the aggrieved governors have been working against their party for months. They have been insisting that the national chairman of their party, Iyorcha Ayu, must resign in order for a Southerner to take his place, claiming that this was the absolute minimum necessary for the party to remain peaceful.