….Demand for their resignation –
Staff of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have called for the immediate resignation of members of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party. The staff under the umbrella of PDP Staff Welfare Association, at a press conference yesterday also accused the NWC members of squandering the sum of N12 billion belonging to the party in nine months.
The staff who addressed the media against the background of the termination of the appointment of about 50 per cent of their members by the NWC, said the intervention of the anti-graft agencies is necessary before the party leadership “finally takes the party to the grave yard.” Chairman and Secretary of the group, Ngozi Nzeh and Dan Ochu-Baiye, noted that the political fortunes of the PDP have continued to since the coming on board of the present NWC in March 2012. But the party’s National Secretary, Prof. Adewale Oladipo and the National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, dismissed the allegations as baseless and nonsense.
“They are free to make allegations. We have asked them to bring letters from their state chairmen to prove they are loyal to the party. All these are diversionary and we are not bothered,” Metuh said in a telephone interview. He described the allegations as curious and wondered why it came at a time the party was demanding for the removal of the Director-General of the Department of State Services (DSS) and the acting chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). PDP had requested the few staff retained to obtain letters of confirmation of loyalty to the party from their respective state party chairmen.
Apart from accusing the NWC members of fraud, the staff added that the leadership has lost all moral right to remain in office as they allegedly were dragging the PDP to extinction. The angry workers also alleged that the NWC compelled delegates to the last presidential convention to pay a levy of N10,000 each, which they said amounted to over N1 billion which was allegedly paid into a private account.
“Never in the glorious history of our great party has its fortunes been so hopelessly mismanaged by an inept and dishonest group whose sworn mission is to permanently destroy and liquidate the lofty organisation that mid-wife the current democratic dispensation.
“The current National Working Committee is only hanging on because of the obscene and bizarre bazaar which they have subjected the purse of the party to. Millions of PDP members are in great pains with the current reality of how the party which in the recent past paraded the most decent and nationalistic Nigerians is now being run aground by a patently incompetent and self centred sets of NWC members.”
