TheCable

The crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has taken a fresh dimension, as the party’s board of trustees (BOT) has asked the Ahmed Makarfi-led committee to relinquish its control of the party.

Citing litigation which followed the inauguration of the committee in Port Harcourt, the board said it would be in charge of the party’s affair until the internal crisis was resolved.

At a meeting at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja, , Walid Jibrin, chairman of the board, said the BoT was the only constitutional organ of the party following contradictory court orders against the national caretaker committee and the dissolved national working committee (NWC).

“We, the BoT are entrusted under the constitution of our party to be in charge of the assets and liability of PDP. Today, the BoT remains the only legal body now in the whole set up and that is why we are here to play our role,” he said.

“We are not here to take over the secretariat. We are here to perform our duties as enshrined in the constitution, hoping that our problems will be resolved soon. We, the BoT have taken it upon ourselves to ensure we play a great role in resolving the problems. We have gone very far in resolving them. We have made some contacts and consultations.

“We are not here to cast blame on anybody. If it means to go to anybody to solve the problem, we will do so.”

He said the BoT had been receiving great cooperation from elders and leaders of PDP for it to do its job.

Jibrin, who said that the board would play its role without fair or favour, saying the BoT would do its best to return normalcy to the party.

“The PDP has come to stay. PDP will never die. PDP will continue to rule. We are only on sabbatical leave and once the sabbatical is over, we are going to take over our leadership because it is our own. We are going back in 2019. But we can only do that if we cooperate and unite,” he said.

On his part, Ojo Maduekwe (pictured), secretary of the BoT, said: “Concerning the national caretaker committee, the matter is being resolved. It will either be resolved by negotiation or by vacating the court orders. We will prefer the matter is resolved internally,” he said.

He said that the biggest impunity was for any party member to go to court on any issue without engaging internal mechanism in addressing it.

Other members of board present were: Ibrahim Mantu, former deputy president of the senate; Stella Omu, former chief whip of the senate and Dan Suleiman, former military governor of Plateau state.