Nigerian Concord Newspaper
The chairman of the Board of Trustees of the People’s Democratic Party, Senator Adolphus Wabara, said his Peace-making Committee was in Benue state today to beg Governor Samuel Ortom to help his committee create an enabling environment to reach out to other members of Governor Nyemson Wike group.
The former Senate President made this known in Makurdi today when he and members of his committee consulted Governor Ortom with the aim of proffering solutions to the lingering crisis in the party.
Recall that members of Wike’s team reportedly backed out of the PDP national campaign council over the insistence of the party’s national chairman, Iyorchia Ayu to remain in power as against his promise to resign if the party produced a Northern presidential candidate.
Wabara during his visit to Ortom urged the Benue state governor to help appeal to other aggrieved members in the camp of Governor Nyemson Wike to enable the party solve the problems on ground.
According to him, every family has its own problems, noting that there is need for every hand must to be on deck to restore peace to the party.
His words: “There is no family without problems and that is exactly why we have came to the head to encourage us with suggestions to solve the problems. As I said earlier, there is no problems without solution. We should just watch our utterances, because we will all come back to the same table in the interest of Nigerians”
Wabara pressed further that it is only PDP that can deliver the nation and provide dividends of democracy like it did in the past 16 years when the party was in power. “God just asked us to give way, eight years, for Nigerians to judge for themselves.” he added.
While acknowledging that the aggrieved members have their points, he promised that “we will look at it as the conscience of the party and come out with a decision very soon. We will reach out to the groups. That is why we came here so that he, (Ortom) will create the enabling environment for us to reach out to others.”
In his reaction,Governor Ortom stated that he is also an aggrieved member but commended the Senator Wabara committee for their peace moves.
His words: “I have been with Wike. We are friends. We are colleagues and we share common understanding on these issues. I commend the BOT for taking these steps because reconciliation is very key and that is why I said that the party leadership would have deployed its internal conflict resolution mechanism long ago.
“I commend this effort, reaching out, discussing and dialoguing. Politics as I know, over 40 years of practice, is full of conflict but you must get to discussing it and finding solutions.
“People have diverse interest. You must look at it and see how there can be a win win. But treating people as if they are nothing or they have no value, does not make sense to me. So that is what the BOT is trying to do and I believe they have seen me, we have discussed, they are also going to see other governors and I believe that at the end of the day, we shall do something that will bring us together”
He further said that: “I am not happy with leadership of the party on what they are doing. We should be working together. They are here as fathers, as leaders and as conscience of the party, to discuss with us. We have met, we have made our positions known severally that we are not happy with the way the leadership the party at the national level is managing the party. They need to do something.”