TheCable

The board of trustees (BoT) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is preparing to meet with all presidential aspirants of the party to discuss the possibility of picking a consensus candidate for 2019.

Walid jibrin, chairman of the BoT, disclosed this at a news conference in Kaduna on Wednesday.

Jibrin said if the aspirants do not agree on  a consensus candidate, the party will be left with no choice than to conduct a primary.
He promised that the board would do its best to carry out its function by “remaining the conscience of the party”.

“Efforts are on ground by BoT to bring all the PDP presidential aspirants together to consider how best they should accept one of them to stand, realising that despite their number, only one person will emerge as a candidate during the primaries and also only one person will emerge as the president of Nigeria,” he said.

“We have men and women of honour in the BoT that will never sell their conscience, and ensure that the best will come out of the presidential aspirant without fear and favour.

“I urge all organs of the party to partner with BoT in this respect. I call on all members of PDP to remain calm and resolute by remaining unshaken with the belief that PDP will take over government at the federal and states with majority of our members in national assembly and state assemblies.”

He, however, reiterated that if the party could give room to more defectors, it “will continue to boost the ego of the party”.

“While we do this, we will also consider the role played by our old and hardworking existing members who supported the party almost to the point of death,” he said.

“No decampee should be pushed away for now. We shall apply conflict management resolution methodology to enable us remain stronger.

“We must at all cost use sacrifice. In the light of the above, PDP shall never condone campaign of calumny against us by the APC as more of their members continue to decamp to PDP.”

Former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, Sule Lamido, former governor of Jigawa state, Ahmed Makarfi, ex-chairman of the PDP, are among the presidential aspirants of the party.