By Uche Amunike
The leading Nigerian opposition party, the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, is facing a fresh crisis as 7 members of the National Working committee, NWC, of the party have resigned from their various positions causing noticeable tension at the Wadata House National Secretariat of the party.
The party’s National Organising Secretary, Colonel Austin Akobundu (rtd), reportedly confirmed the resignations.
The resignation came after a former spokesman of the party’s presidential campaign, Kassim Afegbua accused the chairman and the leadership, of a chain of financial offences, including misappropriation of over N10 billion of party funds.
Afegbua has also called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, to probe the party leadership.
The party chieftains in different letters of resignation addressed to its National Secretary on Tuesday, alleged being sidelined and unfairly treated by the party chairman, Secondus.
They however promised to continue to be loyal to the PDP but maintained that they will not be able to work with the current National Working Committee.
The resignation took place during an emergency National Working Committee meeting.
The National Youth Leader of the party, Sunday Ude-Okoye has also called the National Chairman of the party, Prince Uche Seconds to step aside, while accusing him of crippling many departments and units in the Secretariat.
He described the party chairman as someone who has nothing to offer the PDP, while stressing that more members of the NWC were aggrieved by his leadership style.
He threatened to tender his resignation if the party chairman refused to heed the call to step down.
Hear him: ‘Today, I have asked him (Secondus) in our NWC meeting to resign his position as the chairman of this party because he cannot lead this party to victory.’
‘I am also asking the leaders, the governors, the founding fathers, the youth, the women to rise up to rescue our party.’
‘I am here to make it very clear to all Nigerians that if Secondus does not resign from the party, I am going to leave the party for him.’
‘The governors, if they don’t wade into this matter right now, I assure Nigerians that within the next three, four days, my (resignation) will be made public.’
‘Seven deputies have already resigned their positions today because of Secondus. Many more people are also going to resign in the NWC because of Secondus.’
‘Right now, I can tell you that not less than eight to ten persons within the NWC members are very aggrieved with Secondus.’
The aggrieved youth leader did not rule out the possibility of impeaching the party chairman if he failed to resign.
The PDP spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan has however called for calm. He implored aggrieved members to apply available internal dispute resolution mechanism to address their grievances.
His words: ‘The National Working Committee of our great party at its meeting today, received the notice of the resignation from deputies who are elected members of the National Executive Committee.’
‘The meeting of the National Working Committee and the deputies immediately took place to dialogue on the issues that were raised. The party will look into the grievances raised by members of NEC as well as members of the National Working Committee.’
‘The internal conflict resolution mechanism of our party has also been immediately activated to put these issues behind us.’
‘We call on all the leaders, stakeholders and members of our great party to remain calm as we collectively resolve these issues.’
The resigned members are, the Deputy National Financial Secretary, Deputy Legal Adviser, Deputy National Auditor, Deputy National Publicity Secretary, Deputy Women Leader, and Deputy Organizing Secretary.
The seventh resigned member was yet to be confirmed as at the time of filing this report.
