A former senator, Dino Melaye has revealed why Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike can’t force the removal of Iyorchia Ayu as the National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Melaye Speaks On PDP Crisis
The PDP has been embroiled in crisis since the conclusion of its presidential primary election in May after Wike lost to the former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, and subsequent picking of Delta State Governor, Ifeanyi Okowa as running mate.
Atiku and Wike held a closed-door meeting in London last Friday with a few of their close allies in attendance on the way out of the seeming PDP crisis.
It was gathered part of the agreement reached during the meeting was that Ayu should be removed as PDP chairman and accommodated in the party’s new government when it is formed.
However, speaking with the Nigerian Tribune at the weekend, Melaye said Ayu would not quit, asserting that the PDP governors were instrumental in Ayu becoming national chairman.
Melaye, who is the spokespersons of the Atiku Presidential Campaign Organisation, maintained that the PDP national chairman would not step down ahead of the general election.
He said: “I want to start by saying that the PDP Governors were the ones who introduced and picked Iyorchia Ayu.
“You cannot give birth to a child in the morning and come back in the afternoon and disown the child, you are not going to be a good parents. We didn’t choose Ayu; the governors did and that is why Ayu was the consensus candidate. Did they field anybody against Ayu from the South during the convention? All of them including Governor Wike endorsed Ayu on convention day.
“Not alone did they endorse Ayu, they funded that convention! “So, how can you in December give us a product, in June, July, you want the product to leave?
“When they brought Ayu as a consensus candidate, that was the only office that was not contested on the day of convention, that was the only office that had the consensus of all the Governors whether South or North.
“Did they forget at the time they were fielding Ayu that Ayu was a Northerner? Or did they just suddenly realize that Ayu is a Northerner?
“More importantly, you can’t be talking of Ayu leaving when we have not won the presidential election. Is it the cart before the horse or the horse before the cart? “
Melaye described as unfounded, a claim that there was an agreement before the election of the party National Working Committee (NWC), that Ayu would resign from his exalted seat as national chairman, if a Northerner picked the presidential ticket of the main opposition party.
He said, “No, there was no such agreement. So, if that kind of arrangement happened and we did not win the election, God forbids this time around, you remove your chairman and you did not win the election, does that make any sense?
“So, it is after we have a president elect that you can now start saying the President and the party chairman cannot come from the same region of the country. That makes more sense.
“You are going to throw us into constitutional crisis because Ayu was not appointed, he was elected at a convention, anything you do to Ayu now will create a constitutional crisis for PDP and these are all coming from the ruling party trying to create confusion and legal tussles that will have negative effects on our election and we will not allow it “
Melaye further dismissed a claim that Wike would eventually dump the PDP, noting that having given his words at the venue of the presidential convention, on no account would the governor defect to another party.
He said, “I say it with every blood in my vein that Wike is a PDP man; he is not going to leave PDP and he is going to work with Atiku Abubakar because I know that Wike is a man of honour.
“He is a man of his words and I was live and present at the convention, where Wike held the microphone and said he is a PDP man 100 percent and that whoever emerges (here today) as the presidential candidate, that he is going to support the person. I know Wike is 59 going to 60 years old and he is a mature man; he is not going to eat his words,” Melaye said.
KanyiDaily recalls that Governor Nyesom Wike had asked Atiku Abubakar to blame those around him if he lose the 2023 presidential election.
