The immediate past deputy governor of Edo, Comrade Philip Shaibu, has predicted the exit of more governors from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) following the defection of Delta Governor Sheriff Oborevwori from the PDP to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
Tribune Online recalls that Oborevwori had on Wednesday, announced his defection from the PDP alongside his deputy, Monday Onyeme, member of the state executive council, members of State House of Assembly, the 25 local government chairmen, some members of the National Assembly and the “biggest” catch being Oborevwori’s predecessor and the PDP vice presidential candidate to former vice president Atiku Abubakar in the 2023 general elections, Ifeanyi Okowa. There have been reports in the media that the governors of Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom will soon announce their defection to the APC.
Shaibu, who spoke with journalists on Thursday in Abuja, said the reason mass exodus has hit the PDP was because those at the helms of affairs have drifted away from the vision and ideology of the party and are only preoccupied with greed to satisfy their self-interest to the expense of the people they supposed to lead.
He said rather than build the party in line with its vision statement, some cabals have hijacked the PDP completely and see the party as their personal property and dictate who takes and gets what from the party according to their discretion.
The former deputy governor added that Nigerians in no distant future will see the gale of defection that will hit the PDP which will see some governors move to the APC which he described as progressive in nature.
Shaibu stated that Nigeria has reached a stage and passed the level where nobody can lay claim to ownership of any party as things are evolving and new leadership emerging periodically. He said PDP is on life support and may crumble anytime soon saying the party may not have more than two governors left in its fold when the dust finally settles. He particularly singled out Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State for his stance on some critical and important national issues saying only a progressive governor can think and act like him (Makinde).
He said, “I’m so excited with what happened in Delta State and it’s not surprising anyway because in my short stay in PDP for about three years and before my exit and even while I was in PDP before the issues of the quarrel and the abnormality that took place. If you recall, for the first six months that I rejoined PDP, I made a statement that was misunderstood which led to one of the governors then asking me who is my father for me to be threatening the party.
“At the end of the day, people were saying he’s just an activist he’s just saying whatever he likes. But I’m not just an activist-politician saying whatever I like, but I saw that the name given to the party, the Peoples Democratic Party, and being in the party at that time, six months into the party, and I saw that it was not actually democratic. The players were not democratic, the leadership was not democratic and I shouted. And then I was asked to keep quiet.
“And while the issue of primary also started, I made statement and I said if the leadership of this party refused to obey their own constitution and do the needful, that in the next one year, there may not be PDP because the players that I see in charge of the PDP and the way I see things happening in the PDP does not show what PDP actually stands for in terms of the name, the acronym, and the mission.
“When I was leaving for APC some of you asked me why I was leaving and I said I did not see a future in PDP in Nigeria because the way the players are handling the party, is not about the party but about the players and when you don’t feel belong when certain cabal feel they are in charge. Nobody can claim ownership of any party in Nigeria because at a particular given time leadership emerges.
“I also said that even the governors that I see I’m not seeing most of them remaining in the party because I’m close to some of the them and I share the same feeling with them. I see more governors leaving. Any progressive governor cannot remain in PDP and the is why when I saw the meeting in Oyo State it was already late.
“I like the governor of Oyo State he is one of those progressive governors that say it the way it is. He refuses and made it categorically clear that he will not be part of this process. If you check his utterances they are positive to rebuild the party. So, when you see some candidates as candidates for life and they continue in that attitude I see only two governors remaining.”
Shaibu, however, commended the leadership style of the national chairman of the APC, Alhaji Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, for the establishment of The Progressive Institute (TPI) which is to serve as the official policy think tank of the party and saddled with the responsibility of conducting research, advising the party and mapping up a strong progressive ideology for the ruling party.
“Politics is supposed to be built on ideology. And that is why I said that any political party whose mission, and vision are not built on ideology is going to be temporal and the leadership is going to be temporal as well. When you have a progressive leader in that party, the party will have everybody in and when you have a reactionary leader, the party will disintegrate and that is what is happening with our Nigerian political parties.
“The leadership is the one that determines the vision of a party and that is why I recently salute the courage off the chairman of the APC, Abdullahi Ganduje, for the political institution that they established. If we can follow that Institute, we can now start grooming leaders towards a particular ideology. For PDP, the vision of the leader is ambition and when everything is not working towards the ambition of the leader, the quality of the party reduces.”
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