• Begins work on 2014 National Conference
report, others
Onyebuchi Ezigbo and Ndukwu Cynthia in Abuja
The All Progressives Congress (APC) has described
the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) definition and
understanding of the restructuring of Nigeria as
shallow and far from what Nigerians are asking for.
The two main parties had since last week been
engaged in a debate on an issue that has recently
become the centre of national political discourse in
Nigeria.
The APC said it had decided to exhume the national
conference reports of 2005 and 2014 which the PDP
inaugurated but failed to implement it.
The ruling party, while reacting to PDP’s scathing
criticism, urged the opposition to stop misleading
Nigerians on the issue of restructuring since it failed
to address it during its 16 years in office.
APC said as the ruling party between 1999 and 2015,
PDP organised two national conferences, in 2005 and
in 2014 but failed to implement its reports.
In a statement issued by its National Publicity
Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, the party said it
was currently working with reports of previous
national conference.
“But the appropriate behaviour would be for them to
respect the efforts we are currently making to deliver
on our party’s manifesto on restructuring.
“It must interest the PDP that we have dusted up the
reports of their national conferences from the
shelves they had left them to gather dust and those
reports are now forming part of the work we are
doing with our committee, which they have tried hard
to denigrate.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the APC believes in the
restructuring of the country. It is at the very heart of
our party’s manifesto as explicitly stated in Section 3
(1) thus: “We will devolve more revenue and powers,
such as policing to states and local government so
that decision making is closer to the people. We
pledge to bring the government closer to the people
through fiscal and political decentralisation, including
local policing,’’ the ruling party said.
APC said PDP’s position would have been a welcomed
development, given that it provides opportunity for
bi-partisan cooperation on the very important
national issue, but for the false claim it made.
APC said it was concerned about PDP’s rather
shallow interpretation of restructuring as against
what is desired by Nigerians.
The party said a cursory review of the referenced
parts of its constitution suggests that either the PDP
is “deliberately out to mislead or it just does not have
an appropriate understanding of the restructuring
that Nigerians clamour for.
“For instance, preamble 2(b) of the PDP constitution
quoted by Adeyeye states: ‘To work together under
the umbrella of the party for the speedy restoration
of democracy, the achievement of national
reconciliation, economic and social reconstruction
and respect for human rights and the rule of law.’
“If statements such as the above are what he PDP
intends to pass off as restructuring, this should
further confirm that the party is still not in tune with
the aspirations and dreams of the Nigerian people.
“It is indeed amusing that after being in power for 16
years, PDP is just waking up to realise that its
constitution prescribed restructuring. If this is not
political opportunism, we wonder what it is. We
understand that PDP needs desperately to return to
reckoning; and realising that restructuring is the new
political currency in Nigeria, it is now latching on and
even claiming to be an apostle!
“As the ruling party between 1999 and 2015, PDP
organised two national conferences, in 2005 and
2014. They had nine years between the first
conference and the second one and one full year
between the time the report of the 2014 conference
was submitted and the time it lost power in 2015.
“Perhaps, if PDP show which aspects of the two
reports it had implemented in the time it had, then
perhaps Nigerians might begin to take them seriously
on the issue of restructuring.”
Meanwhile, APC has said it did not zone its
governorship ticket of Anambra State
The party’s National Working Committee (NWC) said
yesterday in reaction to a report that it may have
zoned the governorship ticket in Anambra State to a
particular part of the state, describing it as false.
“The party has not taken any such decision. We are
committed to providing equal opportunity for all the
aspirants to compete freely and democratically at the
primaries. All aspirants that have been cleared by the
party to contest in the primaries should therefore
ignore the misleading report,” it said.
Also yesterday, the party inaugurated another peace
committee to undertake the reconciliation of warring
parties in the lingering intra party crisis rocking its
Kogi State chapter. The seven-man committee
headed by Gen. Idris Garba (rtd) is the second
committee to be set up for the state after the earlier
one headed by Tony Momoh. www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2017/08/22/pdps-understanding-of-restructuring-nigeria-shallow-says-apc/