It was gathered that if the People Democratic Party (PDP) national convention had held last year or early this year, stakeholders would have allowed the South-west produce the chairman, since there would have been enough time between the time of the convention and the next general election in 2019.
But because the convention did not hold earlier as anticipated, party stakeholders felt that there was no time “to begin another trial and error,” since the convention was holding close to an election year, Sunday Sun reports.
“One of the factors that worked against the South-west is the crisis in that zone. It will be dangerous to play into the hands of the ruling party. They could use any of our dissident members to drag us back through the various cases in court in the zone,” one of the sources told Sunday Sun.
“If you observe very well, at the beginning, Secodus was not in the race. He was drafted into the race when it became clear that we could run into trouble waters if we leave it in the South-west.
“We also reasoned that there could be danger if we insist on a South-west chairman. I laugh when people say a certain governor was the one calling the shots. How can you put your money somewhere and the people who have not contributed a dime would say the man who is contributing should not call the shots? It defies logic.
“Suppose we insist and produce a South-west chairman and the South-south and South-east decide to pull out and refuse to fund the party. Won’t the party die? All these are some of the factors that were put into consideration to arrive at our decision,” another source disclosed.
Reminded that South-west too was strategic in the build up to 2019, he said, “I agree with you. And that was why we set up a post convention’s reconciliation committee. It has not been formally agreed upon, but we are already toying with the idea of taking the vice presidency slot to the South-west.” (Sunday Sun)