Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as
pirants, who were disqualified from
participating in last weekend state
assemblies primaries yesterday stormed
the party’s national secretariat in Abuja
with coffin in protest.
The aspirants, who came with party
thugs, carrying empty coffins, blocked
the entrance to Wadata Plaza.
National Woman Leader, Kema Chikwe
and National Vice Chairman, South-
South of the party, Cairo Ojougboh,
were turned back by the aspirants.
Some of them, who spoke with
newsmen accused the PDP National
Working Committee and the state
chapter of the party of conniving with
former Minister of State for Education
and governorship aspirant, Nyesom
Wike of frustrating their aspirations.
A state Assembly aspirant, Davis Saloka,
from Eleme constituency, said they
were at the PDP secretariat to kick
against the “open robbery perpetrated
against them by the party.”
Saloka told newsmen that no fewer than
107 members of the party paid to obtain
the expression of interest and
nomination forms, but noted that only
32, whom he claimed were loyalists of
Nyesom, were given what he called
“dubious clearance,” while the rest of
them were disqualified.
“We all bought forms to participate in
the PDP primary election but what we
saw was out of the ordinary.
“We attended the screening exercise but
we did not know our fate until Friday
night when we saw a list pasted, in
dicating that only 32 persons were
cleared to participate in the election.
“We discovered that those nominated
from Wike’s camp were given clearance
which gave them automatic ticket while
the rest of us were screened out.
“The most annoying thing was that we
were not told the reason we were
disqualified, and it is more curious to
note that all we saw was a list that was
neither signed nor was on a PDP letter
head, but just contained the names of
Wike’s boys as the only ones cleared to
participate in the party primary.
“On Saturday, they just wrote the
names of these people and said they
were the winners of the PDP party
primary where elections were not held.
“It is injustice, we won’t accept it,” he
said.
Another aspirant, Jude Nwibie, from
Kana Constituency 2 spoke in similar
vein and submitted that he was
disqualified without any cogent reason.
He further disclosed that he went
through the rigour of the screening
exercise like his colleagues in
accordance with the party’s guideline
for the election, but was surprised that
the result of the screening exercise was
not made public.
He, however, said he was stupefied to
see a list of 32 persons pasted a night
before the party primary as the cleared
aspirants for the race.
“A huge injustice was visited on us by
the party just to please Wike an Ikwere
man who wants to succeed another
Ikwere man.
“Money was collected from us for
nomination form but we were prevented
from participating in any party
primary,” he said.
In a joint petition signed by 31 of the
aggrieved aspirants under the aegis of
Coalition of Rivers State PDP House of
Assembly and National Assembly
aspirants, they demanded the
dissolution of the Rivers State chapter of
the party, led by Felix Obuah and the re
moval of Deputy National Chairman of
the ruling party, Uche Secondus.
Source:- Sun News
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