The national leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) met with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Tuesday to discuss the lingering crisis over the position of its national secretary.
The meeting at the INEC headquarters in Abuja started at 2:30 p.m. and went into a closed-door session immediately after the opening ceremony.
The meeting followed a letter to INEC by the PDP inviting the commission to its 100th NEC meeting scheduled for June 30.
The letter, dated May 30, was only signed by PDP’s acting national chairman, Umar Damagum.
In its reply dated June 13, INEC notified PDP that its letter was not in compliance with the requirements of part 2(12)3 of the Regulations and Guidelines for Political Parties, 2022.
The commission stated that both the national chairman and national secretary shall jointly sign the notice for a convention, congress, conference, or meeting and submit it.
At the meeting, Mr Damagum said they were at INEC headquarters to enable the party’s leaders to interact with the commission to guide them on decisions regarding the status of its national secretary.
“We are here today, pertaining to the status of our national secretary; we have gone into litigations, I think, from the beginning of last year until when the Supreme Court made a pronouncement of which INEC was a party to that litigation.
“We are here to interact sincerely with you off-camera so that we will be guided on this problem of national secretary, which we found ourselves into,” Mr Damagum said.
The INEC chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, noted that the meeting was at the instance of the PDP, saying that, as the regulator of political parties, the commission’s door was always open to party leaders.
He recalled that not long ago, INEC received similar visitors from the Labour Party.
Mr Yakubu recalled that in the last couple of months, the commission had received about five letters from the PDP regarding the party’s secretary.
“In the last couple of months, we received letters from the party saying that one Mr Sunday Udeh-Okoye was the secretary. Thereafter, the party changed its mind and said it was Samuel Anyanwu.
“The party later changed its mind to say that it was Mr Setonji Koshoedo. And again, the party changed its mind to say Anyanwu,” the INEC chair said.
Mr Yakubu said the last letter received from the party had no signature from the secretary and was only signed by the chairman.
“We hope when we go into the working session, we will fully understand where you are coming from and what more you expect from us as the registrar and regulator of political parties,” Mr Yakubu said.
After the closed-door session, Mr Damagum said the party’s leadership would meet with the larger PDP stakeholders on the matter and return to INEC on Thursday.
Also in attendance at the meeting were the chairman of the PDP Governors Forum, Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State, Governors Seyi Makinde of Oyo, Dauda Lawal of Zamfara State, and Caleb Muftwang of Plateau.
Others included former Senate President Bukola Saraki, former governor of Kaduna State Ahmed Makarfi, Senate minority leader Abba Moro, former governor of Bayelsa Seriake Dickson, the PDP’s national organising secretary Umar Bature, and Ben Obi, among others.
(NAN)
