PDP zones 2019 presidential candidate to the north, says Secondus

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) National Working Committee (NWC) on Thursday in Abuja zoned the party's 2019 presidential candidate to the northern part of the country.

The PDP acting National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, stated this while receiving the party’s Post Election Review Committee led by the Senate Deputy President, Sen. Ike Ekweremadu.

Secondus said that the decision was important based on the zoning principle of the party and in following the recommendation of the committee.

``The NWC had agreed that for us to move this party forward, we must obey our constitution; we must follow our rule and the principle of zoning, which is very important.

``Therefore, we agree with the committee absolutely that the presidential candidate of our party in 2019 would come from the North,’’ Secondus said.

Secondus promised that the NWC would implement the recommendations of the committee’s report to the latter, without any fear, for the survival of the party.

``The NWC will commence the implementation of this report by passing it through all consultative and decision making organs of the party up to the National Executive Committee (NEC) and the National Convention Committee.

``Equally, you can be assured that those of us in the NWC will put in place machinery to review and implement recommendations that are very urgent,’’ he said.

Earlier, Sen. Ekweremadu, while submitting the committee’s report said one of the committee’s recommendations was that the party should strictly apply the zoning principle at all levels.

He said that in particular, since the last President of PDP extraction came from the Southern part of Nigeria that of 2019 presidential elections should come from the North.

Ekweremadu, who was the chairman of the committee, said: ``this is in accordance with the popular views expressed in the submissions to the Committee.

``This will also assuage any ill feelings in the North over any perceived breach of the Party’s zoning principle.’’

He recommended that the PDP should henceforth be ``self-funding, relying on membership registrations and enforcement of dues and levies as its primary sources of income at all levels in line with the party's Constitution.

``This is with a view to ending the prevailing situation where those who pay the piper dictate the tune.

``We have also recommended that the role of party leader, which has no basis in the constitution of the PDP, should henceforth be discontinued at all levels.

`` This is to strengthen the structure of the party at all levels.’’

Ekweremadu further recommended that the Party should adopt the direct primary method as the sole means of electing its candidates for any election at all levels.

``The use of delegates has been grossly compromised and abused, and should therefore be discontinued forthwith to return true ownership of the party to the people,’’ Ekeremadu said.

He proposed a nationwide biometric membership registration to align PDP records with modern technology.

The PDP Post-Election Review committee was inaugurated on May 5 in the wake of the party’s performance in the last general elections.

The committee was handed a nine-point terms of reference, the sum of which was to find out what went wrong and to chart a trajectory for the restoration of the fortunes of the party. (NAN)