There is palpable tension in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) after the acting National Chairman of the party, Umar Damagum met with state chairmen, ahead of next week’s meeting of the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the opposition party.
The meeting held at the PDP national secretariat, in Abuja, yesterday and was attended by state chairmen of the party from across the country.
However, speaking before the closed door meeting, Damagum debunked claims that the meeting was meant to mobilise state chairmen to perpetuate himself in office as acting national chairman.
Tension has been mounting in the opposition party over Damagum continued stay as acting national chairman while the NEC meeting scheduled for November 28, is expected to take a position on the leadership of the party.
Nevertheless, the acting national chairman said the meeting is simply to interact with the state chairmen.
He said, “My chairmen, who are my commanders in the states, this is not an unusual meeting. We have had this kind of meeting before. This is not the first time, for the record, I want to make it very clear this meeting is to interact with the state chairmen.
“You can see from the introduction, more than half of the state chairmen here are brand new, for us to know ourselves and also discuss other matters such as the coming zonal congresses.
“It has nothing to do, like has been insinuated in the social media, about NEC or something of that nature. You can read it.
“I have not met any of you chairmen, from the time you were invited until in this hall, if I am right. So, for the record, I want to set the record straight. There is no such issue.
“Issues of NEC are entirely within the purview of the National Working Committee (NWC) and the chairman. So, we are not calling the chairmen here to insinuate anything.
“Just for the record, it is a normal interactive session to welcome the new chairmen that have just joined us and also to get to know ourselves and to further discuss the ongoing zonal congresses. As you know, there are already forms for the zonal congresses.”
Chairman of Imo State PDP, Austin Nwachukwu, who doubles as interim chairman PDP Chairmen’s Forum, told newsmen after the parley that the event was a familiarisation meeting.
According to him, more than half of chairmen in attendance were newly elected as such the meeting was imperative to foster unity among them.
“The NWC deemed it fit to gather all of us in Abuja to enable us know each other. It is essentially to familiarise ourselves with the NWC and those of them whose tenure are still running and will be running out next year,” Nwachukwu said.