Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) has explained why it did not conduct elections into its national offices despite its earlier insistence that the convention will hold in compliance with a July 4 Federal High court judgments in Port Harcourt.
Fielding questions Wednesday from newsmen in Government House, Port Harcourt, Publicity secretary of the National Caretaker Committee, Prince Dayo Adeyeye said the party did not want to create any atmosphere of chaos so it went for extension of the tenure of the caretaker committee in place of elections at the convention.
He said some leaders of the party had mooted the idea of relocating to another venue to conduct elections of the party but it was resolved that security operatives could still come to disrupt the exercise.
Adeyeye said the decision to extend the tenure of the Senator Ahmed Markafi Caretaker Committee had redressed the lacuna that could have arisen if the convention had not held.
“The party inaugurated the new NEC today and it met and decided to go ahead with our national convention. The convention relocated to the secretariat of the party in Rivers state. The place was big enough to accommodate all the delegates of the party and other leaders of the party.”
“The convention took some decisions that the tenure of the CTC be extended by 12 months, the CTC be expounded from 7 to 13. Members are not to contest for any elective office of the party,” he said.
He said security operatives ignored an interlocutory order from a High Court in Port Harcourt to provide security for the convention, choosing to respect the Abuja High court order.
Adeyeye said security operatives should also have complied with another High court judgment in Abuja that said Ali Modu Sherif was never a Chairman of the party.
He further expressed strong hope that the party will come out stronger from the crisis.
“Thank God we had our convention and within these twelve months everything will be settled. The federal high court in Port Harcourt made very sensitive pronouncements that the convention should go ahead but they were ignored by security agencies. We have a judgment of court delivered by Justice Mohammad Liman that gave legality to our convention,” he said.
