The acting National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Uche Secondus, on Thursday insisted that he and other remaining members of the party’s National Working Committee would not resign.
Secondus said this after he led the NWC members to a closed-door meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan.
The meeting was held inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja barely 24 hours after Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu and Chief Tony Anenih resigned as the party’s national chairman and the Board of Trustees chairman respectively.
Secondus said this after he led the NWC members to a closed-door meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan.
The meeting was held inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja barely 24 hours after Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu and Chief Tony Anenih resigned as the party’s national chairman and the Board of Trustees chairman respectively.
Secondus, who took over as the national chairman of the PDP in acting capacity, described the call for the resignation of all the NWC members the same way Mu’azu did as unconstitutional.
He had shortly after taking over as the acting national chairman on Wednesday met behind closed-doors with Jonathan at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
When asked by State House correspondents to respond to call for the resignation of all the NWC members, the acting national chairman said, “You know that (call for the resignation of all NWC members) is not right, it is unconstitutional, because the chairman did that voluntarily and the BoT Chairman also did that voluntarily.
“Some of the others have tenure. At the end of our tenure, if we are re-elected, fine; if not, fine. That is the right thing to do.
“There is no reason for us to resign because we have worked hard.”
Despite the coincidence in the resignation of Mu’azu and Anenih, Secondus insisted that none of them was forced to resign.
“Sometimes, it happens that way. Nobody forced them to go.”
Secondus stated that other members of the NWC decided to interact with the President who is the party’s national leader on latest developments in their fold and the way forward.
He said with Mu’azu’s exit, the new leadership would sit back and “re-organise and re-invent” the party.
The new PDP boss assured party members and other stakeholders that the party remained intact with no problem threatening its continued existence.
Hours after Mu’azu and Anenih resigned, a top PDP member told The PUNCH that Secondus would not remain in office for too long.
He had said, “All of them (the members of the party’s NWC) are guilty of the charges against Mu’azu. We were calling for the removal of all of them. But since we could not get that, we changed our strategy to get their leader out.
“So Secondus will only remain there for some time; once we get a new leader, he will watch over them.
“Apart from that, we need to be a strong opposition party and to do that in the present circumstances we have to get a credible person from the North. We are going to push for a Northern person who will give us a presence in the North.”
The PUNCH also gathered on Thursday that some chieftains of the party had mounted pressure on other members of the NWC to resign.
A highly placed member of the party who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue said, “There is nothing more to be said, Chief Fani-Kayode has said it all.
“The remaining members of the NWC must leave for us to rebuild our party. That is the only condition. We cannot have traitors among us and expect to correct the mistakes of the past.”
Before going to the Presidential Villa, Secondus presided over his first meeting as acting chairman of the party.
The meeting, which was held at Wadata Plaza national headquarters of the PDP in Abuja, had in attendance most members of the NWC. The National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, was however absent.
He was said to have travelled abroad for an undisclosed reason. It was also not clear why the Bayelsa State Governor, Seriake Dickson, was at Wadata Plaza, but soon after he left, members of the NWC ended their meeting and proceeded to the Villa.
