Okowa As PDP VP Candidate Was A Matter Of Choice – Kola Ologbondiyan

Mr Kola Ologbondiyan is the immediate past National Publicity Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and acquitted himself with his articulation of the positions and pursuits of the party while he held office between 2018 and 2019.

He recently came out to give a clarification of the issues that were thrown up by the emergence of Atiku Abubakar and Ifeanyi Okowa as presidential and vice-presidential candidates of the party.

He asserts that the decision to throw open the presidential ticket was a unanimous decision of the Governor Samuel Ortom led 37 man committee on zoning. He further asserts that the decision to pick Governor Ifeanyi Okowa as the running mate was came out of the recommendations of the panel constituted by the party which threw up three persons, all of whom he asserts were qualified for the position.

Mr Kola Ologbondiyan , how do you describe the state of your party, PDP in the light of the issues arising from the choice of presidential running mate?

Let me begin by saying that the party is encountering turbulence as we speak presently, but the managers, the drivers of the party have an understanding of the deft moves it will take to bring us out of the current turbulence.

I quite accept that there was a decision to be taken, but whether taken rightly or wrongly, a decision has been taken.

The three vice-presidential nominees presented to the candidate were eminently qualified to occupy the office of Mr. Vice President.

However, I normally tell people that in our own party, the Peoples Democratic Party, we always encounter the challenge of choice when it comes to decision making because the people that have been lined up to be decided upon are eminently qualified.

Governor Wike is known as Mr Projects in terms of infrastructural development, he has done well, he has been (LG) chairman, he has been chief of staff, he has been minister, and he has been governor going to eight years. So, he is eminently qualified.

Governor Okowa has also been a local government chairman, he has been Secretary to the State Government, he has been a state commissioner, he has been a senator and as chairman of the Senate Committee on Health he demonstrated capacity, and you can see the number of Federal Medical Health Centres that were built under his chairmanship.

If you go to Governor Udom, he is a modern developer who understands wealth creation.

So, when you have such men before you to be decided upon, you must definitely be challenged by the decision of choice.

So, having said this, a decision has been made and party decision expectedly are supreme. However, we cannot say that those who will have some forms of complain, those who will have issues with the way the decision is being managed should not complain.

However, I want to assure our party members as a follower of everything that is happening in the party and from my understanding of running a political party, I will appeal to those who are presently complaining to allow the leaders of the party to come in and manage the issue.

How do you react to the decision to throw the PDP ticket open which has now fueled dissent on the part of former Governor Fayose?

I have been in conversation with former Governor Ayo Fayose since that tweet. We had our discussions and I expressed my own opinion. I will not want to bring to the front burner, issues that I believe that the party had taken decisions on and whether rightly or wrongly, the party is moving on.

I am aware that the party constituted a committee in 2019 which was in the manner of the Ike Ekweremadu Committee of 2015 and that committee was chaired by Governor Bala Mohammed.

That committee was supposed to search why did we lose the 2019 election even though in the party we believe that we won that election and we were arm-twisted and another result was declared.

The committee came up with a report on why we lost and also proceeded further to say that ahead of the 2023 election that the party should look in the direction of the Northeast and the Southeast for the presidential candidate even though somebody like me who is from the North-Central believes that the report of the committee was unfavourable given that the North-Central has not produced a president from 1999 to date.

However, the committee also provided a caveat in its report that incase that the party does not want to go by zoning and decides to go by way of merit that it should declare the contest open in order to elect whoever the party considers as meritorious.

Unanimity To Throw PDP Ticket Open – Kola Ologbondiyan

This report was brought to the party but decision was not taken on it. However, when the Ayu NWC emerged and ahead of the 2023 election, it set up another committee now chaired by Gov Samuel Ortom that it should go and advice the party on how to go on zoning ahead of 2023. The membership of this committee was on a ratio of one per state and the FCT making 37.

Aside one nominee that didn’t sign on the report, 36 members out of 37 signed the report approving that ahead of 2023 that the candidature should be made open.

If you set up a committee of 37 persons on equal basis of one per state and they return a report to the party saying rather than going by zoning make it open let everyone come out and contest and this report has superseded the report of the Bala Mohammed Committee which said “zone to the Northeast or the Southeast” and at the end of the day the party’s decision prevailed that it should be declared open.

Then we went to the convention and those delegates who had votes elected a candidate, I think that decision is in line with the wishes of the party and it is supposed to be supreme. I will boldly say without being rude to the person of Governor Fayose that even delegates from Ekiti participated in that decision.

So, to me the issue of going South no longer stands because even the South participated in that decision and a candidate has emerged.

What is important like as part of the decision that was taken at that last NEC where the decision of the committee was approved it was decided that hereafter if the party decides to go back to zoning and to go to a particular area or a particular geopolitical zone, it can return to it.

GreenWhiteGreen GWG reports that Kola Ologbondiyan served as PDP National Publicity Secretary from 2017 to 2021

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