Babangida: Wike Slams Weak PDP National Leadership |The Source

By Gideon Njoku

Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State has chided the Leadership of his Party, People’s Democratic Party, PDP, for not taking a disciplinary action, against the ex-Governor of Niger State, Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu, for publicly saying that he worked against the PDP in 2015.

Aliyu, PDP, a few days ago, said he, and other PDP Northern Governors, worked against the success of the Party’s Presidential candidate, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, in favour of the Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Major General Muhammadu Buhari.

At the time, Jonathan was the incumbent President, while the now President Buhari was the candidate of the APC.

Buhari defeated Jonathan during that election, and is doing his second term in office as President.

In an unnecessary revelation a few days ago, Aliyu disclosed that the Northern PDP Governors at the time, worked against Jonathan’s victory, because the former President breached an alleged agreement he had with them not to be a contestant in the 2015 Presidential Election, having completed late President Umaru Yar’Adua’s tenure on Yar’Adua’s death. He contested and won in 2011.

Aliyu said a Jonathan victory in 2015 would have been detrimental to the North. Meaning that the PDP Northern Governors collected money for the Presidential campaign, and either pocketed the money, or used it to work for Buhari.

For long, speculations had been rife over the role played by Northern PDP Governors as well as the Leadership of the PDP at the National Level, as represented by the former Governor of Bauchi State, Adamu Muazu. Jonathan lost in all the Northern states considered PDP stronghold.

But Senator Jonah Jang, Governor of Plateau State at the time, has denied Aliyu’s claims, insisting that he never worked against Jonathan. He vehemently denied that. Remarkably, though, the PDP, also, lost Plateau State for the first time in 2015.

In his reaction, Jonathan dismissed Aliyu as a blatant liar who had since lost every political relevance, and was looking for relevance. He challenged Aliyu to bring evidence of any such agreement, and say where and when such an agreement was reached.

On Tuesday, April 21, an angry Wike joined the fray in an interview with the AIT, slamming the PDP Leadership for condoning such sabotage against the Party as exhibited and revealed by Aliyu, without invoking a disciplinary action against him.

He said what Aliyu did was not only unconscionable, but going public with his treachery was the limit.

He said that if he was in the shoes of the National Working Committee of the Party, NWC, he would since have disciplined former Governor Aliyu.

Wike: “If I was the leadership of the party, I would have suspended Aliyu for that comment he made. But, you see nothing will happen. The National Working Committee will not do anything. Why? They need Aliyu to support them.

“I cannot understand why you are a leader, so to speak, you come out and tell the world why you fought your party.

“I have never seen a thing like this in my life. Assuming you did it, you now want to rub it on them that nothing will happen.

“If I was the leadership of the party, I would have suspended Aliyu and heavens will not fall. What does he want to achieve?

“This was 2015. We have done 2019 election. Jonathan had lost in 2015, why do you come out now to say how you fought him?

“Look at where we are today. So, you are telling us you made us to be in this position where we are.

“You are telling Nigerians that you are one of those who have kept Nigeria in this state that we are. And then the National Working Committee will not do anything because Aliyu Babangida is one of the untouchables.”

In same manner, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, Jonathan’s Media and Publicity Campaign Director, in a tweet, asked all the other Nothern PDP members who sabotaged Jonathan to come clean just as ex-Governor Aliyu did.

Fani-Kayode, specifically, mentioned former National Chairman, Adamu Muazu, former National Security Adviser to Jonathan, Rtd Col Sambo Dasuki, and former Principal Secretary to President Jonathan, Hassan Tukur, and challenged him to come clean.

Unconfirmed reports reportedly, say Tukur was the one who recommended the immediate past INEC Chairman, Professor Attahiru Jega, to Jonathan. The then President appointed Jega without knowing him.