A member of the Board of Trustees of the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Gordon Bezimo has asked the All Progressives Congress to take a cue from the PDP which has eliminated rancour by endorsing President Goodluck Jonathan.
Bezimo said this in an interview with newsmen in Abuja, on Tuesday.
He was reacting to the condemnation of the endorsement by the APC.
The BoT member who is also the chairman of the governing board of the National Youth Service Corps, also said he saw no reason why the decision to endorse the president became the business of the opposition party.
He said “They should make themselves busy with how they can get their own candidates. I can assure you that by the time they finish, they will understand the advantage of having a consensus candidate.
“Secondly, it is the practice in civilised climes that once you have a sitting President who is doing well, you do not subject him to party primaries, because the acrimonies and disagreements that follow primary processes tears a party apart.
“So if you can avoid it, you endorse the President to go for a second term. So, we are teaching the other parties what to do, although it would take them a long time to get presidency, but even if it is 60 years from now, if they happen to produce the President, they should do what we are doing.”
However, reacting to Bezimo’s suggestion, National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Alhaji Lai Mohammed said while the practice of endorsement was democratic, there was nothing to emulate about the way the PDP went about endorsing the President.
He said “The price being paid for Mr. Jonathan’s endorsement by Nigeria is simply too heavy, considering that the PDP governors who spearheaded the endorsement have now secured perpetual immunity from prosecution by anti-graft bodies, including the EFCC and the ICPC; the automatic tickets for all first-term PDP Governors, whether or not they have performed, the automatic tickets for all PDP governors running for the Senate, as well as the free ride back to the Upper Chamber for Senate President David Mark.”
Mohammed also recalled that the fact that leading lights in the American Democratic Party endorsed President Barrack Obama did not prevent Senator Hilary Clinton from seeking the party’s nomination.
Earlier, while speaking about the just concluded National Conference, Bezimo who was a member said decisions reached at the conference were capable of taking Nigeria to the next level if implemented.
He listed some of the issues which were addressed to include: marginalization, state creation and resource allocation.
According to him, the implementation of the conference report has been broken into three with the President given assurance that he will take care of the part that requires executive action.
He also said the other two parts which require constitutional amendment and legislative action will be forwarded to the National Assembly for implementation.
Bezimo equally dismissed calls for the scrapping of the NYSC as myopic. He said the scheme has over the years provided the required platform for national integration. Click to signup for FREE news updates, latest information and hottest gists everyday
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