Chieftains of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Enugu State reacted yesterday to a report alleging that loyalists of the House of Representatives Speaker Aminu Tambuwal, including the party’s consensus governorship candidate, Mr. Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, are under watch by the Presidency.
They warned President Goodluck Jonathan to be wary of the antics of fifth columnists, who want to make him lose his support base through rumour mongering.
The former National Chairman of the party, Dr. Okwesilieze Nwodo, who is a member of the Board of Trustees (BoT), Amb. Justina Eze, also a BoT member and another chieftain of the party reacted to the report.
They said it was an “insult on the leaders of the party in the state to reduce their hard-earned popular decision for 2015 to the whims of the personal decision of Tambuwal.”
Speaking in interviews, Eze, Nwodo and another PDP chieftain, who preferred anonymity, agreed that whatever happened in the National Assembly had nothing to do with the decision of the indigenes to support the emergence of Ugwuanyi as the “very popular consensus candidate of the party.”
The PDP chief said it was clear that those behind the campaign against Ugwuanyi “are those who feel they have failed to convince our people that they are the better materials for governorship and they have shown that they have failed.”
Nwodo said: “What does Tambuwal stand for and how does that affect the plausible decision of all times that the people of the state have just taken that this young man (Ugwuanyi) is our party’s consensus candidate?
“We as leaders in Enugu State with our people have spoken and anybody casting aspersions on that decision should be ready to face the music.
“Such people should know that the days of imposition and secret anointing of aspirants, who are unpopular, are over and anyone who wants to test his popularity should get ready to do that on November 29 when we hold our primaries. It has been shown that our decision on Ugwuanyi remains the most popular since the creation of our state and they know it.”
Eze said: “The action of the faceless people, who wrote the report of Tambuwal’s men on the watch, is stupid. They are dangerous to the aspiration of President Jonathan.
“These are people, who have failed to visit their constituencies for years and nobody knows what they are doing at the National Assembly. They have remained very unpopular among our people and they now want to deceive the President to become the enemies of popular leaders, who will help him to earn votes.
“I advise President Jonathan to be wary of these desperate politicians, who have no capacity to attract votes for him during the coming elections.”
The PDP chieftains said Ugwuanyi earned his position as a long-standing chairman of the Committee on Marine Transport in the House of Representatives, having held it even during the tenure of former Speaker Dimeji Bankole, adding that the International Maritime Organisation found the lawmaker worthy of the position he was holding. – Chibota Edozie.
