-Saraki alleges persecution, provocation
-Lauds Osinbajo, Oshiomhole’s peace efforts
-Party can’t serve my people’s aspirations – Kwara gov
-Their exit inconsequential – Okorocha
– Atiku, PDP welcome defectors
-We won’t allow Senate President hijack party – Ex-minister Sulaiman
After months of political rigmarole and manoeuvrings, embattled Senate President Bukola Saraki, finally dumped the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) and returned to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Saraki, who made this known via his Facebook account yesterday’s evening at exactly 6:05pm, cited prosecution and provocation, among other reasons that caused his defection.
Senate President Saraki, who is presently in Ilorin, wrote: “I wish to inform Nigerians that, after extensive consultations, I have decided to take my leave of the All Progressives Congress (APC).” Kwara gov too Similarly, Governor of Kwara state (Saraki’s home state), Abdulfatah Ahmed, also defected to the PDP, because, according to him, the APC “can no longer serve as a platform for achieving the aspirations and expectations of his people.” Ahmed’s defection was made known in a terse statement signed by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Communications, Dr.
Muyideen Akorede, in Ilorin yesterday.
The terse statement read: “Following due consultations with the people and in response to calls by major stakeholder groups in the state, Kwara state Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed today defected to the Peoples Democratic Party(PDP), having realised that the All Progressives Congress (APC) can no longer serve as a platform for achieving the aspirations and expectations of his people.” Prior developments Ahead of their defection, the APC national secretariat, had on Monday, dissolved the Kwara state executive of the party, led by Ishola Balogun Fulani.
In its place, the party announced a caretaker committee, headed by Bashiru Bolarinwa, who, before then, was the factional chairman of the party in the state.
And preceding the aforementioned developments, some members of the National Assembly, had also defected from the APC to APC and ADC, a move that has continued to generate discourse among watchers of unfolding political events in the country.
Before now, both the Presidency and the party hierarchy embarked on several peace moves to stop the planned defection.
My grouse – Saraki Giving a detailed lowdown on his reasons for the defection, Senator Saraki said the decision “was inescapably imposed on me by certain elements and forces within the APC”, even as he lauded the peace moves by both the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and the APC National Chairman, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole.
Announcing the decision in a lengthy statement, Saraki said: “I wish to inform Nigerians that, after extensive consultations, I have decided to take my leave of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
“This is not a decision that I have made lightly.
If anything at all, I have tarried for so long and did all that was humanly possible, even in the face of great provocation, ridicule and flagrant persecution, to give opportunity for peace, reconciliation and harmonious existence.
“Perhaps, more significantly, I am mindful of the fact that I carry on my shoulder a great responsibility for thousands of my supporters, political associates and friends, who have trusted in my leadership and have attached their political fortunes to mine.
“However, it is after an extensive consultation with all the important stakeholders that we have come to this difficult but inevitable decision to pitch our political tent elsewhere; where we could enjoy greater sense of belonging and where the interests of the greatest number of our Nigerians would be best served.
“While I take full responsibility for this decision, I will like to emphasise that it is a decision that has been inescapably imposed on me by certain elements and forces within the APC who have ensured that the minimum conditions for peace, cooperation, inclusion and a general sense of belonging did not exist.
“They have done everything to ensure that the basic rules of party administration, which should promote harmonious relations among the various elements within the party, were blatantly disregarded.
“All governance principles which were required for a healthy functioning of the party and the government were deliberately violated or undermined.
And all entreaties for justice, equity and fairness as basic precondition for peace and unity, not only within the party, but also the country at large, were simply ignored, or employed as additional pretext for further exclusion.” Continuing, the Senate President explained that “the experience of my people and associates in the past three years is that Why we dumped APC for PDP they have suffered alienation and have been treated as outsiders in their own party.
“Thus, many have become disaffected and disenchanted.
At the same time, opportunities to seek redress and correct these anomalies were deliberately blocked as a government-within-a-government had formed an impregnable wall and left in the cold, everyone else who was not recognized as “one of us”.
This is why my people, like all selfrespecting people would do, decided to seek accommodation elsewhere.” On his efforts at a rancour-free relationship between the legislature and executive, he said, “I have had the privilege to lead the Nigerian legislature in the past three years as the President of the Senate and the Chairman of the National Assembly.
The framers of our constitution envisaged a degree of benign tension among the three arms of government if the principle of checks and balances must continue to serve as the building block of our democracy.
“In my role as the head of the legislature, and a leader of the party, I have ensured that this necessary tension did not escalate at any time in such a way that it could encumber executive function or correspondingly, undermine the independence of the legislature.
“Over the years, I have made great efforts in the overall interest of the country, and in spite of my personal predicament, to manage situations that would otherwise have resulted in unsavoury consequences for the government and the administration.
My colleagues in the Senate will bear testimony to this.
“However, what we have seen is a situation whereby every dissent from the legislature was framed as an affront on the executive or as part of an agenda to undermine the government itself.
The populist notion of anti-corruption became a ready weapon for silencing any form of dissent and for framing even principled objection as “corruption fighting back”.
“Persistent onslaught against the legislature and open incitement of the people against their own representatives became a default argument in defence of any shortcoming of the government in a manner that betrays all too easily, certain contempt for the Constitution itself or even the democracy that it is meant to serve.” “Unfortunately, the self-serving gulf that has been created between the leadership of the two critical arms of government based on distrust and mutual suspicion has made any form of constructive engagement impossible.
Therefore, anything short of a slavish surrender in a way that reduces the legislature to a mere rubber stamp would not have been sufficient in procuring the kind of rapprochement that was desired in the interest of all.
“But, I have no doubt in my mind, that to surrender this way is to be complicit in the subversion of the institution that remains the very bastion of our democracy.
I am a democrat, and I believe that anyone who lays even the most basic claim to being a democrat will not accept peace on those terms; which seeks to compromise the very basis of our existence as the parliament of the people.
“The recent weeks have witnessed rather unusual attempts to engage with some of these most critical issues at stake.
Unfortunately, the discord has been allowed to fester unaddressed for too long, with dire consequences for the ultimate objective of delivering the common good and achieving peace and unity in our country.
Any hope of reconciliation at this point was therefore very slim indeed.
Most of the horses had bolted from the stable,” Saraki said.
On the failed peace moves, the lawmaker said, “the emergence of a new national party executives a few weeks ago, held out some hopes, however slender.
The new party chairman has swung into action and did his best alongside some of the governors of APC and His Excellency, the Vice President.
I thank them for all their great efforts to save the day and achieve reconciliation.
Even though I thought these efforts were coming late in the day, but seeing the genuine commitment of these gentlemen, I began to think that perhaps it was still possible to reconsider the situation.
“However, as I have realised all along, there are some others in the party leadership hierarchy, who did not think dialogue was the way forward and therefore chose to play the fifth columnists.
These individuals went to work and ensured that they scuttled the great efforts and the good intentions of these aforementioned leaders of the party.
Perhaps, had these divisive forces not thrown the cogs in the wheel at the last minutes, and in a manner that made it impossible to sustain any trust in the process, the story today would have been different.” And on the new platform, he said, “for me, I leave all that behind me.
Today, I start as I return to the party where I began my political journey, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
“When we left the PDP to join the then nascent coalition of All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2014, we left in a quest for justice, equity and inclusion; the fundamental principles on which the PDP was originally built, but which it had deviated from.
We were attracted to the APC by its promise of change.
We fought hard along with others and defeated the PDP.
“In retrospect, it is now evident that the PDP has learnt more from its defeat than the APC has learnt from its victory.
The PDP that we return to is now a party that has learnt its lessons the hard way and have realised that no member of the party should be taken for granted; a party that has realized that inclusion, justice and equity are basic precondition for peace; a party that has realized that never again can the people of Nigeria be taken for granted.
“I am excited by the new efforts, which seek to build the reborn PDP on the core principles of promoting democratic values; internal democracy; accountability; inclusion and national competitiveness; genuine commitment to restructuring and devolution of powers; and an abiding belief in zoning of political and elective offices as an inevitable strategy for managing our rich diversity as a people of one great indivisible nation called Nigeria “What we have all agreed is that a deep commitment to these ideals were not only a demonstration of our patriotism but also a matter of enlightened self-interest, believing that our very survival as political elites of this country will depend on our ability to earn the trust of our people and in making them believe that, more than anything else, we are committed to serving the people.
“What the experience of the last three years have taught us is that the most important task that we face as a country is how to reunite our people.
Never before had so many people in so many parts of our country felt so alienated from their Nigerianness.
Therefore, we understand that the greatest task before us is to reunite the county and give everyone a sense of belonging regardless of region or religion.
“Every Nigerian must have an instinctive confidence that he or she will be treated with justice and equity in any part of the country regardless of the language they speak or how they worship God.
This is the great task that trumps all.
Unless we are able to achieve this, all other claim to progress no matter how defined, would remain unsustainable.” “This is the task that I am committing myself to and I believe that it is in this PDP, that I will have the opportunity to play my part.
It is my hope that the APC will respect the choice that I have made as my democratic right, and understand that even though we will now occupy a different political space, we do not necessarily become enemies unto one another,” the statement concluded.
Buhari won’t need them to win -Okorocha But the Chairman, Progressives Governors Forum and Governor of Imo state, Rochas Okorocha, has assured that the defection of the duo would not in any way affect the return of President Muhammadu Buhari in 2019.
He said they were free to leave since they felt their interest was no longer protected in the governing party.
Speaking with newsmen last night shortly after Comrade Adams Oshiomhole-led National Working Committee (NWC) swore in the new Imo state chairman of the party at the National Secretariat in Abuja, Okorocha described political party as a vehicle which politicians use to get to their destinations.
He said: “They didn’t tell me when they joined the party and I don’t want to know when they are leaving.
So, people are entitled to their opinion on how they see issues.
“Political party is just like a vehicle with which you get to the appointed destination, and if they found that they can no longer get what they want in APC and they want to get to other parties, good luck! “But the question you should ask me is that, how does that affect the party in 2019? I don’t see in any way it has affected the party negatively, and the issue there is that President Muhammadu Buhari will win this election come 2019.
“He is more stronger and firm, he will do better than how he had done before in terms of electoral values.
So, their defection is allowed.
As they are going, many people are still coming into the party in their thousands.
It is neither here nor there.
We shouldn’t make a big issue out of it.
Saraki is entitled to his political opinion and he wants to leave, good luck and the governor of Kwara, my colleague leaves, good luck.” It won’t be business as usual – Exminister And in another reaction, a Kwara PDP chieftain and former Minister of National Planning, Professor Abubakar Olarenwaju Sulaiman, has welcomed the defectors into the party’s fold, but warned that Saraki cannot ‘hijack’ the platform.
Speaking with Blueprint on the telephone last night, the governorship hopeful noted that Saraki would have to operate within the ambit of the party’s constitution.
He said: “Saraki’s defection to PDP is a welcome development.
It is part of our collective responsibility to wrestle power from APC come 2019.
Also, his return to PDP will add value to our fortunes at the polls come next year.
“I, however, hope that he would act within the confine of the PDP’s constitution and allow for a level-playing ground for all our members, and allow those who he met on ground have their way and the Kwarans to have their say.
“His return is not a threat to my governorship aspiration, because it is not reversible.
Everything belongs to God.
But his coming back to the party is not all about me, but it is a national interest.
“However, his return will not be business as usual.
Also, let me clarify, the 60:40 sharing arrangement people are talking about in PDP is speculative.
We are talking and negotiations are ongoing with the leadership of our party.”.
Kwara PDP chair speaks Meanwhile, the PDP Chairman in Kwara state, Akogun Iyiola Oyedepo, has said he would convene a stakeholders’ meeting where a position would be taken on Saraki’s return to the party.
Oyedepo, who also spoke in a telephone interview with one of our correspondents, said though Saraki and the state governor have the right to defect to any party of their choice, but would not be categorical on whether he would work with them or not.
“He (Saraki) has the right to defect to any party he wants that is his choice.
On whether, I will work with him or not, I can’t say for now.
I will need to hold a stakeholders meeting”, he said.
He, however, denied his speculated defection to APC over Saraki’s return to PDP saying: “I have not moved, I am still in PDP.”
