Elder statesman, Chief Edwin Clark, has urged the acting national chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Ambassador Illiya Damagum to resign from his position and not to allow the party to collapse on him.
Clark, who stated this in an open letter he wrote to Damagum dated April 24, 2024, also said the PDP National Executive Committee (NEC) showed “obvious weakness” by allowing the Minister of Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, to “bamboozle everyone in the meeting,” adding that “No one was ready to speak truth to power.”
The elder statesman who decried the state of party under Damagum’s leadership said, “This is a clarion call on you, Mr. Acting National Chairman, to either sit up, or do the needful by resigning from the position, so that the party does not collapse on you.”
Clark said Damagum’s leadership of the party has confirmed allegations that he was doing the bidding of Wike.
The elder statesman, in the letter, lamented Damagum’s inaction in the PDP crisis in Rivers State, including the defection of PDP state lawmakers, the caretaker committee list.
He said, “It is alleged in some quarters that Mr. Wike is very instrumental to your being appointed the Acting National Chairman, and you, therefore recognise him as your “boss”.
“So, it appears to some people the obvious role you embarked upon, playing down the powers of NEC. It does also appear that the party’s National Working Committee (NWC), is made up of Mr. Wike’s men, which includes your good self as Acting National Chairman, the National Secretary, the National Publicity Secretary, some leaders such as Chief Dan Orbih, who unfortunately is not a cheap of the old block of his father, late Chief MCK Orbih, a great politician. We were all together in the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), in 1979.”
He added, “Just two days ago, after the so-called NEC meeting, and without having regard to the Governor’s Forum and the NEC’s appeal, the party was slammed with an ex-parte order issued by a federal high court in Abuja, barring the PDP NWC from reviewing Rivers State Caretaker Committee list.
What is happening to our reputable judiciary, when it is clearly stated by the Supreme Court that internal affairs of political parties, should be left for the parties to handle? If the PDP NWC and other members of the party are sincere, honest and actually believe in the party, they should go to court to challenge this baseless interim order that seeks to interfere with internal affairs of the party.
“To imagine that the NEC and the NWC of the party, turned blind eye to all that is happening in the PDP in Rivers State, because it is said you have a paymaster controlling you, is unbelievable,” he wrote.
