PDP CONVENTION ABORTED: WHAT IMPLICATIONS FOR DEMOCRACY?

The cold news from the Sharks Stadium, Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Wednesday, August 17, 2016, was that the much disputed Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Convention scheduled to elect new officers to lead the party for the next four years was aborted; the reason was that Police had sealed off the premises, apparently in obedience to a court order from Federal High Court Abuja, delivered by Justice Okon Abang, early Tuesday morning. The convention was subsequently postponed to next year by convention chairman, Governor Nyeson Wike. He said the action was to allow the party to settle all court disputes. Well said.

But with this development, questions are bound to be asked: first is whether this is not payback time for the oligarchic party for the disastrous sixteen years past? Or better still, a clear writing on the wall for them to reform or go burst?

Whichever way, the sealing does not portend well for the PDP and democracy. If anything, this is a moment for sober reflections. No one needs to tell the party apparatchiks that what is playing out now may well lead to eventual dismantling of the entire structure; the party is clearly at the crossroads.

What started like a child play between members of the same “family” was allowed to snowball into a full blown crisis. For Alhaji Ali Modu Sheriff, to wrestle the party to a standstill with various court injunctions is a clear indication that something wrong. They are supposed to be birds of the same feather but why they can’t flock together is the mystery the Expose News will try to unravel.

After much research, the Expose News discovered that at the epicenter of all PDP crisis is money. For the past sixteen years, as available records have shown, they made a mess of it leaving behind a trail of   misery, tears, pain and serial broken promises. They not only displayed a high degree of selfishness, they also took parochial decisions which left the country with a litany of abandoned projects, dilapidated infrastructures, degradation of all kinds including the rise of militancy, agitations for separation and genocidal tendencies. The pogrom in the North and the emergence of oil bandit’s even in remote places as Arepo in the south –west is not what you call a good record.

Critical sectors of the economy were left in ruins; fuel supplies became paralyzed and for the first time Nigerians began to hear of how a few “trusted” officials used their positions to plunder the economy. Crude oil sales were cornered and whatever was left of the nation’s foreign reserves were wiped out! Power supply became epileptic; vital government Institutions were converted to conduit pipes for stealing billions! Signs that the economy was down became visible at the airports where few aircrafts were in operation.

Add the fact that they reveled in the art of public deceit not to mention having an army of recycled “products” presented again and again for crucial elections! It was the aftermath of these reckless policies that awakened the consciousness of Nigerians to fight back and rescue their nation from doldrums and the grip of godless leaders who think of nothing but themselves. The 2015 Presidential elections presented that purpose and you could only imagine the hatred against the PDP at the time. It was no surprise then how the results sent them packing from Ruling to opposition party!  

Now instead of showing remorse, they are back to the same old mistakes, using the same people that milked the country dry. Instead of application of common sense, they are having the same officials wanting to return under the same circumstances. The same court cases, bickering for power –not the welfare of the people who now know they are being taken for a ride.

Therefore, this latest gambit in Port Harcourt should be seen as much as an escape route as an opportunity for real change-or what you call atonement. Those people who took part in the looting spree of the Jonathan era should be shown the door; any attempt to accommodate them will only produce the same result: old habits die hard! This is the only way for democracy to grow in Nigeria.