PDP: Jonathan Harps on Discipline as Amaechi Files Suit to Stop Probe

President Goodluck Jonathan

• Rivers governor accused of aligning with opposition  

•Gov insists he remains bona fide member of ruling party   

•Court asked to stop PDP special national convention

In a veiled reference to the combative stance of the Rivers State Governor and Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) Chibuike Amaechi, which has led to his suspension from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), President Goodluck Jonathan Thursday made it abundantly clear that the party would not tolerate indiscipline.

Jonathan made this observation when he received the leadership of the Rivers State chapter of the PDP which visited him at the State House, Abuja.

However, in a bid to keep the presidency and party at bay, Amaechi has approached a Port Harcourt High Court seeking to stop the leadership of the PDP in the state from evaluating the performance of his administration.

At the court, presided over by Justice Godspower Chiji Aguma, Amaechi, through his counsel, Mr. Adedayo Adedipe (SAN), sought to restrain the Chief Felix Obuah-led PDP in the state from probing his cabinet.

He is also asking the court for a preservative order based on the application for preliminary objection filed by the counsel to defendants for parties to maintain the status quo.

The PDP leadership in the state was said to have set up a committee to evaluate the performance of officials of the state, a move believed to be targeted at some key functionaries with a view to seeking their removal from office.

When the matter came up yesterday, the presiding judge, Aguma, ruled that all parties to the suit should maintain the status quo, pending the determination of motion for preliminary objection filed by the counsel to the defendants.

He said while it was necessary for the court to decide on the issue of jurisdiction raised by the defendants, the parties in the suit should not take any action that would affect the issues raised in the suit.

The judge said though the parties have raised issues of jurisdiction, the court cannot pretend that the issue of res has not been raised, and adjourned the matter to July 30 to rule on the issue of jurisdiction.

The plaintiffs in the suit include Amaechi, his commissioners, Senator Magnus Abe, all local government chairmen in Rivers State, and the Rivers State House of Assembly, while defendants include the PDP, Mr. Timothy Nsirim, Obuah and the state Secretary of PDP, Mr. Ibibia Walter.

However, the president, at the meeting with the Rivers State chapter of the party in Abuja Thursday, said the PDP would no longer condone indiscipline, noting that Rivers State was a “key state” that is crucial to the political calculations in the south and the entire country.

He said if the leaders of the party there were not focused, committed and united, there would be uncertainty in the political landscape of the entire country.

“Rivers State is a key state to South-easterners. It is a key state that needs very strong leadership, focused leadership, committed leadership and maximum political unity and stability. Otherwise anything could happen and affect the whole country,” the president stated.

He added: “For us to have a stable democracy, we have to have a strong political party. And that is why we get worried when we notice some of the indiscipline in some of the political parties. And the new PDP that we are all working together for no longer tolerates this indiscipline.

“All over the world, parties are supposed to build on ideological differences. May be if you look at the classical case of Social Democratic Party (SDP) and National Republican Convention (NRC) that were created by the military, their ideology was a little to the right and little to the left. But that is the essence of politics.

“But in a situation where somebody is in a particular political party but his faith is in another political party, that cannot be tolerated. For those who are not holding political offices, yes you can excuse.

“But if you are holding an elective office, you cannot be in one party and be working for another party. Otherwise, why are you there?”

On his part, Obuah pointedly expressed disappointment with Amaechi’s conduct and accused him of aligning himself with the opposition political parties, thereby working against the interest of the president.

Obuah, who led the state party’s leadership including the former governor of the state, Peter Odili, and Minister of State for Education, Ezenwo Nyesom Wike, disclosed this to journalists at the close of the meeting, which lasted for about two hours.

He said: “We are pained and our heart bleeds today that the main champion of opposition in the country against Mr. President and indeed the Federal Government of Nigeria is our own son, Governor Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi.

“This is indeed shameful. We do not know what has come over the young man. Is it that he wants to destabilise the PDP before his eventual movement to his new party, having been handed the ACN/APC structure in Rivers State?

“Unfortunately, he has repeatedly rebuffed every effort by us and well-meaning Nigerians to make him show remorse and respect for the Office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”

Apologising for the disrespect shown the president and the First Lady, Patience Jonathan, by Amaechi, Obuah recognised Wike as the leader of the party in the state, and wondered what had come over the governor whom he said was bent on disuniting the PDP by building the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state.

Also speaking, Wike insisted that there was no misunderstanding between him and the president and blamed journalists and the press unit of Government House, Port Harcourt, for doing a “syndicated job” which indicated that Jonathan had snubbed him at the weekend when the president arrived Port Harcourt en route to Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital.

According to him, the president was happy with his grassroots mobilisation and indeed acknowledged him at the airport, a situation which he said infuriated Amaechi and compelled the governor to go to church, where he referred to him (Wike), out of frustration and anger, as a “betrayer”.

In his remarks, Odili noted that the leadership of Rivers PDP and its executive members came to interact with the president, stressing that the meeting, which he described as a re-union was very cordial.

On the crisis threatening the PDP in Rivers State, the former governor said it was not without solution, pointing out that: “What is important is for us to recognise that at any point in time, respect for authority, respect for the rule of law and discipline are the guiding principles that will make us run whatever system or societies we are running in an orderly, disciplined fashion in a way that will be inclusive for all stakeholders to contribute maximally to the well-being and purpose of the organisation.”

Assuring Nigerians that the problem would soon be resolved, Odili said: “You will see an end to these exchanges that have put Rivers State PDP in a bad light.”

Some of those in attendance at the meeting were the Minister of Housing, Lands and Urban Development, Ms. Ama Pepple; former Deputy Speakers of the House of Representatives, Hon. Austin Opara and Chibudom Nwuche; former Minister of Transport, Abiye Sekibo; Senator Lee Maeba; Chief Sergeant Awuse; and the former state Chairman of the Rivers PDP, Chief Uche Secondus.
Reacting to Obuah’s address, Rivers State Commissioner for Information and Communication, Mrs. Ibim Semenitari, said the party chairman had the right to express his personal opinion.

She stated that contrary to what Obuah said, Amaechi was not opposing Jonathan, his leader and a man whose success he had devoted his time and resources to.

She pointed out that even the presidency had cleared the air over the relationship between the president and “his younger brother, the governor”, and that there was no rift between them.

According to her, recent history had proved that Obuah’s attempt at casting aspersions on Amaechi is an attempt at seeking relevance.

On the allegation that Amaechi had constituted himself into an opposition to Jonathan because he planned to leave the PDP, Semenitari reaffirmed the position of the governor that he had no intention of leaving the party, adding that he remained the leader of the party (PDP) in the state.

Semenitari said: “I think that we have made it clear where we stand; Governor Amaechi is a member of the Peoples Democratic Party, as governor of Rivers State.

“The party constitution recognises him as the leader of the party in the state. That is the fact that I am sure Mr. President has. I doubt very much that Mr. Obuah’s comments, which are really purely his opinion, requires a response from my part.

“Mr. Obuah is an individual who has a right to his opinion in a democracy. The only thing is he’s got to remember that he needs to be guarded in his speaking because his right to freedom of expression stops where the right of the other person begins and he must not, in an attempt to seek relevance, do so by fomenting trouble, for want of a better word.

“He has the right to his opinion, but he has to express it within the confines of decorum and appropriate behaviour.
“Governor Amaechi is not in opposition to Mr. President and has never been. Governor Amaechi recognises the president as the leader of the PDP, the party he belongs to, and so I do not think that Governor Amaechi, under any guise, constitutes himself into an opposition.

“People must remember history. I hope that we do not need to remind Mr. Obuah of the position that Governor Amaechi took during the Doctrine of Necessity and the fact that this was a governor that was in the fore front of insisting that the acting president, now Mr. President, should immediately take over to avoid a vacuum in the national interest.”

In the meantime, the leadership crisis rocking the PDP took a turn for the worse Thursday as three members of the party have asked an Abuja High Court to stop the party from holding its planned special national convention.

The plaintiffs, Abba Yale, Yahaya Sule and Bashir Maidugu, who claimed to be card-carrying members of the party, also asked the court to nullify the processes leading to the appointment of the party’s acting national officers.

The PDP, on its part, Thursday took on the ACN national leader, Senator Bola Tinubu, over his alleged order that a member of the House of Representatives, Hon. Bamidele Opeyemi, should forget for now his ambition to run for next year’s governorship election in Ekiti State.

Tinubu and other top party leaders have already endorsed the incumbent, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, who Bamidele has engaged in a running battle over the ACN gubernatorial ticket.

In the case filed on their behalf by Chief Joe Okutepa (SAN) against the PDP, the plaintiffs also urged the court to restrain the party from convening or holding any meeting or convention in furtherance of the decision of the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the party made during the pendency of an earlier case instituted by them.

They also asked the court for an “interlocutory injunction restraining the national chairman of the party from performing any function or duties assigned to the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party following the resignation and removal of all members of the NWC of the party pending the hearing and determination of this case.”

They asked the court to restrain the party’s National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, “from performing any functions or duties assigned to the National Working Committee of the defendant (PDP).”

The plaintiffs premised their application on three grounds, one of which was that while their earlier suit against the party was pending, “the defendant, acting through its national chairman and National Executive Committee, purportedly made acting appointments to the National Working Committee”.

They argued that the actions of Tukur and the party's NEC were a premeditated move to “undermine and disrespect the authority and power of the court.”

According to them, the party's decision to appoint acting national officers was aimed at overreaching the court and foisting a fait accompli on it.

The three plaintiffs in their earlier suit had urged the court to order the removal of some members of the PDP NWC whose elections were rejected by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) because they did not conform to the party’s guidelines.

However, following the resignation of the affected NEC members, the plaintiffs had withdrawn the suit.

Justice Suleiman Belgore, based on the request of the plaintiffs’ counsel, yesterday struck out the names of the 18 former NWC members whose earlier election/affirmation had formed the subject matter of the litigation.

His decision followed an oral application moved in court by Okutepa. The case has been adjourned until July 15 for further hearing.

PDP, in another development, yesterday accused Tinubu of “carrying his despotism too far” by seeking to bar some persons from contesting the Ekiti State governorship election in 2014.

The party, in a statement by its acting National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Tony Caesar Okeke, said it was extremely “wicked and undemocratic” for Tinubu to order Bamidele to forget his governorship ambition, adding that such an order smacked of tyranny and outright disdain for democracy.

“By ordering a House of Representatives member from Ekiti State, Hon. Opeyemi Bamidele, to forget his governorship ambition in the 2014 governorship election, Tinubu has once again displayed his despotic tendencies and utter disdain for the democratic process.

“This is extremely wicked and indeed the height of tyranny and outright disparagement for the people and their right to choose their leaders as guaranteed by the 1999 Constitution, as amended,” the statement said.

Reminding Tinubu that he is not from Ekiti State and he should not decide for the people, the PDP urged the people of the state “to rise up to the occasion and defend their rights by rejecting the usual practice of allowing godfathers to select their leaders for them.”

news 7:52:00 AM