2019: PDP zones presidency to North

2In from Olumide Olaoluwa …
The next presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will emerge from the north.
The party however did not state which of the three zones in the region will get the ticket.
The party’s Acting National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, made the disclosure at the party secretariat on Wednesday while receiving the report of the Post-Election Review Committee.
Secondus said the decision was part of the recommendations of the committee chaired by the Deputy President of the Senate, Ike Ekweremadu.
He described the report as a turning point in the fortune of the party, saying the PDP is well organised and ready to play the role of vibrant opposition.
The party chair stated that the report of the committee would be presented before other organs of the party for adoption and ratification.
Ekweremadu had, while presenting the report, stressed the need for the party to strictly adhere to the zoning principle at the local, state and national levels.
He said: “Since the last president of PDP extraction came from the southern part of Nigeria, it is recommended that PDP’s presidential candidate in the 2019 presidential election should come from the northern part of the country.
“This is in accordance with popular views expressed in the submissions to the committee.
“This will also assuage ill feelings in the north over any perceived breach of the party’s zoning principle”.
‎The committee also recommended that the title of “party leader” be discarded forthwith at all levels, as it has no basis in the constitution of the PDP.

Read also: Nigeria at 55: Respect Buhari, PDP tells Nigerians

The committee also recommended that the party do away with the use of delegates for picking its candidates for elections, saying the process had been grossly compromised and abused.
Instead, it recommended the adoption of direct primaries as means of electing candidates for elections at all levels.
This, according to the report, was a practical way of returning the party to the people.
“It is recommended that the party should henceforth be self-funding, relying on membership registration and enforcement of dues and levies in line with the PDP constitution.
“This is with a view to ending the prevailing situation where those who pay the piper calling the tune,” Ekweremadu stated.
He proposed a nationwide biometric member registration, with the view to aligning party records with modern technology and further boosting the integrity of the records.
The committee, which was inaugurated on May 5, was saddled with the task of identifying the immediate and remote causes of the party’s poor performance in the last general elections.

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