***Disowns Wike-backed NCC’s national convention
***Event will hold as scheduled, Wike insists
***Ibadan convention worsened crisis, says Saraki
The reconciliation talks between the two factions of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) may have hit the brickwalls after the Tanimu Turaki led group vowed on Friday that it would have nothing to do with March 29 national convention planned by the Abdulrahman Muhammad /Nyesom Wike faction.
The Turaki group said although it remains open to reconciliation, it has filed an appeal at the Supreme Court against the recent judgement of the Court of Appeal which voided the November 2025 National Convention in Ibadan.
The National Executive Committee of the faction held an emergency meeting in Abuja on Friday to review its status.
Its National Publicity Secretary, Ini Ememobong told reporters at the end of the meeting that it was not aware of the national convention being planned by the rival side.
But Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister Nyesom Wike said the national convention would proceed as scheduled.
Ememobong said the Turaki faction was seeking peace in the interest of the party and its members who are interested in contesting elective offices in 2027.
He was optimistic that their decision to head to the Supreme Court would not affect the ongoing reconciliation efforts.
Major decisions taken “in utmost good faith” at yesterday’s meeting, according to him, were: to explore reconciliation, appeal the judgement of the Court of Appeal at the Supreme Court, to take necessary steps to ensure the success of the on-going e-registration and to ensure that the party is on the ballot.
“I can confirm to you that the appeal has not just been filed, that appeal has been entered in the Supreme Court and all the concomitant applications, applications for accelerated hearing and all of that have also been filed,” he said.
Continuing, Ememobong said:“But what we said is that the filing of this appeal does not inhibit the reconciliation processes. The moment agreeable terms are met, parties will withdraw their cases. I mean, courts are usually very happy when parties approach them for discontinuance or withdrawal. So that appeal has been filed and other subsequent legal actions have been taken to protect the position of the party.”
On the reconciliation talks, the spokesman said: “We do know that reconciliation is a journey towards a destination and you measure it by movement. So, movement is being done along that line. The destination of reconciliation will be met and you can bear with me that we have a situation of negative peace at the moment, at least a cessation of hostility.
“You’re not finding both sides trading blames and hot tackles. You’re finding de-escalation in rhetoric, hurtful rhetoric and the rest. What is there is that the journey of reconciliation is on course. The bus has left the station, the train has left the station, but has it arrived at reconciliation? No. Has it passed some bus stations and train stations? The answer is yes.
“Do we want that in public? The answer is no, because we do not pretend that there are no people within and outside who do not want this peace to be. If we let them understand the milestones that we have achieved, it means they know the next bus or train station to wait for us.
“So it’s best that the next time you hear from us, you’ll hear that we have arrived at the destination. How we arrived, whether by helicopter, by plane, would become immaterial, provided it is legal.
“Remember that this reconciliation is made to strengthen the party and the party at this point is an opposition party, it’s not a ruling party. It is not to make the Peoples Democratic Party an appendage of any other party. It is made to strengthen it as an opposition party and a party aligning with the disposition and interest of Nigerians, which is the provision of an alternative to the ruling party.
“So time is clearly an issue and both parties are working along with time as a condition. Irrespective of what both parties are doing independently on their own, it doesn’t affect the reconciliation. When the reconciliation happens eventually, the terms of the reconciliation will determine whether what was done and the things that were done have reached the destination.
On the alleged uncompromising stance of the other faction, Ememobong said: “like I said, negotiation is a destination and a journey. At the point where negotiation begins, you’ll see that people come to negotiations with hard-line positions. But the beauty of negotiation is in the ceding of grounds and time is a critical element in negotiation.
“You find that parties who never sat before begin to sit. That negotiation is going somewhere immediately, parties previously opposed to sitting together agree to sit. You can see that between November and today, that negotiation alone has created people who haven’t sat together, people who haven’t greeted each other. So it is the element of time to achieve the purpose of this negotiation, which is an agreeable consensus and even within the limit of time.
“It is only God who can give an answer whether the negotiation will eventually work or not. Only God can give that answer. But our duty is to act in utmost good faith towards that destination because at the end of the day, men must be men and God must be God.”
He said his group was unaware of any national convention taking place tomorrow.
“There’s no convention coming up to our knowledge,” he said.
He added: “ But we will not begin to deconstruct that because that would be an inconvenient truth. And we cannot be saying those inconvenient truths at these points in public.
“Those are things we are discussing together. It’s like having a wife and someone comes to claim your wife. The wife knows whose wife she is.
“My people say that the owner of a thing does not drag it too much. If you see our disposition, it is because at the end, we hope that we can get to an agreeable situation so that our people can find a solid political platform to run. Let me tell you, we have been speaking against the concept of mutually assured destruction.
“People across the board do know that unless we come to a point of agreement, people running for elections will not be sure of the platforms they are running with. And that is what we want to avoid. We are clearly speaking against mutually assured destruction.”
Addressing the NEC meeting earlier, Chairman of the National Working Committee, Alhaji Turaki (SAN) said “all hope is not lost” in reconciling the two factions.
He said: “It’s also important for me to inform us that every conceivable effort is being made by the leadership to ensure that PDP is on the ballot in all the elections in 2027.
“It’s also my pleasure to inform us also that the leadership is assiduously working round the clock to ensure that the PDP remains a veritable platform for all our members wishing to contest elections, both in 2027 and beyond. We feel that to whom much is given, much is expected.
“For us, all hope is not lost. Indeed, no hope is lost. We must therefore beat our chest and be very proud that PDP is the only party in Nigeria that belongs to Nigerian people.
“Nobody and no group of people can stand up and say, this is our party. We have lost former presidents, we’ve lost former vice presidents, serving and former governors and members of the National Assembly, but that has not affected the survival of this party in any way. So, PDP will still continue to exist by the special grace of God because PDP has become an institution as far as democracy in Nigeria is concerned.”
Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde was not at the meeting.
He reportedly sent his apologies.
PDP national convention ‘ll hold as scheduled, Wike insists; group opts for consensus
However, FCT minister, Nyesom Wike said the national convention of the PDP will take place tomorrow (Sunday) and Monday as scheduled.
He told reporters after inspecting some projects in Abuja yesterday that discussions on reconciliation could continue after the convention, adding that holding the convention would not necessarily preclude reconciliation.
His words: “the PDP national convention will go on as planned. Nobody will stop us.”
He insisted that there’s no faction in PDP but only aggrieved members.
Wike said that he had met with Gov. Bala Mohammed of Bauchi over the planned convention and told him that the convention had to go on.
“People are angry, yes. When a child is angry, well, you will try to see how you can pacify him, but that does not mean that you will allow the child to destroy the house that you have built,” he said.
Faction opts for consensus, retains caretaker leadership
DECENCY GLOBAL NEWS gathered on Friday that the Abdulrahaman Muhammad/Wike faction has resolved to bring in all members of the party’s National Caretaker Working Committee under a wholesale consensus option at tomorrow’s convention.
Sources named former Caretaker National Chairman, Senator Ahmed Makarfi and three-time former member of House of Representatives, Hon Teejay Yusuf – as persons strongly tipped by some party stakeholders for the purpose of actualizing a strong reconciliation and rebuilding process.
But it was understood that Wike and other leaders may have settled for the retention of the NCWS leadership.
Neither Makarfi nor Yusuf had requested for nomination or support last night but supporters, including a highly-visible female Senator who strongly canvassed support for Hon Teejay Yusuf, are said to favour one of them.
Screening of aspirants vying for national positions at the National Convention began in Abuja on Thursday and ended on Friday.
The exercise was conducted by the Screening Committee led by House Minority Leader, Hon Kingsley Chinda.
Earlier, the party had accepted the report of the Zoning Committee led by a former Oyo State Deputy Governor, Hazeem Gbolarumi and Hon Teejay Yusuf which allocated party national positions to various states and geo-political zones, based on past zoning arrangements and consultations, with emphasis on clear zoning arrangements as core of the party’s search for unity and balance.
DECENCY GLOBAL NEWS gathered that few top party stakeholders, including Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde who were unable to present nominees for positions allocated to their state before a reconciliation effort led by former Senate President, Bukola Saraki began to take root, are to be allowed to play significant roles in determining the party’s candidates for various positions in the 2027 general elections.
Party official documents sighted by DECENCY GLOBAL NEWS showed that the zoning of national elective positions along zonal patterns for the national convention is being done as follows:
A. NORTH
National Chairman — North Central
Deputy National Chairman (North) — North East
National Organizing Secretary — North West
National Legal Adviser ~ North Central
National Youth Leader — North West
National Publicity Secretary ~ North East
Deputy National Financial Secretary — North East
Deputy National Women Leader — North East
Deputy National Auditor — North East
Deputy National Treasurer — North West
B. SOUTH
1. Deputy National Chairman (South) — South South
2. National Secretary ~ South East
3. Deputy National Secretary — South West
4. National Financial Secretary ~ South South
5. National Treasurer ~South West
6.National Auditor ~ South East
7. National Women Leader — South West
8. Deputy National Organizing Secretary ~ South South
9.Deputy National Legal Adviser — South East
- Deputy National Youth Leader — South South
- Deputy National Publicity Secretary – South East. In addition to these positions, each of the six geo-political zones is to produce a National Vice chairman.
“Zoning remains vital to equity, unity, and stability within the party; the above distribution reflects the outcome of the Committee’s extensive consultations and deliberations,” the Zoning Committee said.
Ibadan convention worsened PDP crisis,says Saraki
Reviewing the PDP crisis, former Senate President Bukola Saraki said his warning against the Ibadan national convention was ignored by the Turaki faction.
He said the convention has now worsened the crisis in the party.
“I screamed, I shouted at that time, and said, ‘look, don’t let us go and do this convention. The best thing for us at this point in time is let us have a caretaker committee,” Saraki who headed the PDP reconciliation committee prior to the Ibadan convention said on Channels Television on Thursday.
He added:“I made a statement. There was a special committee set up. They came and I told them my advice is that we should not go to that convention.
”We should have a caretaker committee because it was clearly the best solution for us, and that if we did that, we would have avoided this issue of different factions. Unfortunately, they did not heed that advice.
“The purpose of going to Ibadan for any convention was for everybody to be on board and agree on what we were going to do when we got there, and meet all the criteria that had been demanded.
There was the issue of congresses in some states that had not been conducted. There were also talks about who should take which positions across the zones. So, when you go to those conventions, it should be affirmation—you should have resolved issues behind the scenes.
“We said, ‘Don’t go to Ibadan. Don’t go to that convention’. There was no point going. Instead, let us form a caretaker committee. If we had done that, we would not have this crisis.
“Before that, we were not in court. There were not these kinds of cases against different parts of the party until after the Ibadan convention.”
Saraki hinted on Friday that he would be part of tomorrow’s convention.
He confirmed on his Facebook wall that he received a delegation led by Alhaji Abdulrahman Mohammed ahead of the convention. He said:”As we prepare for the Official Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Nigeria National Convention this Sunday, I received members of the National Caretaker Working Committee this evening, led by Chairman Abdulrahman Mohammed, alongside the Caretaker Legal Adviser, Kamaldeen Adeyemi Ajibade, SAN, who came by to appreciate the role I’ve played in the ongoing reconciliation efforts within our party.”
