Benue PDP member urges Ayu to fulfil resignation promise in 2021

A member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Benue State, Adakole Ijogi, on Thursday told the PDP National Chairman, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, to resign from office in accordance with ‘his promise to quit if the PDP produces a presidential candidate from northern Nigeria’ for the 2023 general elections.

Ijogi, speaking on Channels Television on Thursday, maintained that Ayu should fulfil his promise.

Ijogi had stated: “You have the presidential candidate that is fixed, that is Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. You now have the BoT chairman that is not fixed, that is flexible; that can leave or stay. We have the national chairman that can leave or stay. It depends on what the leadership of the party wants.

“They have to agree on what to give and from the feelers, we have gotten, they are requesting that the national chairman paves way for the chairmanship of the party to move south for equity, fairness, and justice, especially, as we are going into the campaigns.

“This is not because there have been some internal wrangling and disagreement within some leaders of the party arising from the way the primaries went.

“I think the national leadership of the party is aware that the Peoples Democratic Party is not one individual and it is not the national chairman of the party that brought in the candidate of the party.

“It is just a simple process to know that the party was built on certain fundamental principles of equity, fairness, justice, inclusion.

“The national chairman of the party, Iyorchia Ayu, promised he was going to resign if a candidate of northern Nigerian extraction emerges.”

The PDP National Executive Council (NEC) has been in for a crucial meeting on the lingering contradictions in the party in the preparations for the electioneering campaigns for the 2023 elections.

The PDP Board of Trustees (BoT) Chairman, Walid Jibrin, had earlier argued that the PDP cannot have the presidential candidate, national chairman and BoT chairman from the north.

He said that the BoT is waiting for the report of a committee set to look into the lingering controversies in the party.