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PDP youth group stages ‘Ayu Must Go’ protest in Katsina, state party denies group

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PDP youth group stages 'Ayu Must Go’ protest in Katsina, state party denies group

A youth group which said it is within the Katsina State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the PDP Youth Movement, on Sunday, occupied the Katsina City Gate in protest to demand the immediate resignation of the National Chairman of the party, Senator Iyorchia Ayu.

The protesting youths who displayed various placards bearing inscriptions such as ‘Ayu Must Resign’, ‘PDP is Not a Private Company’, ‘Fulfil Your Promise’, ‘Northern Youths: We are for justice and fairness’, insisted that for the party to reposition itself towards the 2023 general elections, Ayu must either step down or be removed from office before the polls.

Addressing newsmen during the protest, the leader of the PDP youth coalition, Shehu Isa-Dan’Inna, said the PDP National Chairman should fulfill the promise he made that he would resign immediately after the party’s primary if a northerner emerged as the party’s presidential standard-bearer.

He insisted that Ayu should do the honourable thing, step down and stop parading himself as the party’s chairman to avert the current crisis rocking the party.

“We are calling on the national chairman to fulfill his promise. Ayu said that immediately after the convention when a northern Nigerian emerged as the PDP flag bearer, he was going to step down.

“But for almost six months now, Ayu did not vacate the secretariat, which is why we are calling on Mr. Ayu, as a gentleman and responsible person to step down and stop calling himself the PDP national chairman.

“PDP is not a Northern Peoples Democratic Party or Southern Peoples Democratic Party; we have to be just and united, to enable us to win at various levels in the coming 2023 general election,” Dan’Inna added.

But while reacting to the protest, the PDP Chairman in the state, Alhaji Salisu Yusuf Majigiri denounced the group, saying the organisers of the “Ayu Must Go” protest were outsiders and not members of the party in the state.

“We are not aware of the protest and no right thinking member of the Katsina PDP will stage any protest of that nature,” Majigiri said in a statement on Monday morning.

Read also: Ayu: I’m not afraid of being suspended from PDP, I have options —Wike

“As far as we are concerned, no PDP member in Katsina State is protesting anything. We don’t know them. They are not from the PDP headquarter. They are not from the local government neither are they among the state official of the PDP.

“So who are they? Maybe they were sent from somewhere to come and create issues that are non existent in Katsina State PDP.

“So we are one in Katsina. We are law abiding PDP members and we are supporting our leadership. We don’t have anybody that is protesting against the leadership of anybody or against the candidature of anybody,” he added.

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