The PDP as a party has often not looked back in bringing vengeance upon its high profile members who turn aside from the establishment.
President Goodluck Jonathan once hailed them as the field commanders of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. However, such depiction is no guarantee that the governors can never cry. In the present dispensation a number of governors belonging to the party have been subjected to difficult times arising from infighting in the party.
Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State who was yesterday (Monday) suspended from the party may not have been the first governor to be hounded from or by the party, but he is the first to be suspended by the party.
The reason for Amaechi’s suspension by the National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh was his alleged refusal to heed party directives, ostensibly the party’s instruction that the suspension of the executive of Obior Akpor local government be rescinded.
Instructively, the suspension carried out by the Rivers State House of Assembly was a fall out of the crisis that emerged following the internal war triggered by a section of the party to wrest control of the party from the governor.
The faction led by the Minister of State, Education, Nyesom Wike took control of the state executive of the party upon a court judgment that recognized the congress purportedly organized by the faction.
Ngige, Ladoja, Haruna, Mbadinuju and Amaechi
The decision to suspend Amaechi follows a directive from the new executive of the party led by Felix Obuah ordering the governor and the House of Assembly to reverse the suspension of the Obior Akpor executive.
Chinwoke Mbadinuju
The first executive governor of Anambra State was the first governor of the fourth republic to be forced out of the PDP.
The first executive governor of Anambra State was the first governor of the fourth republic to be forced out of the PDP.
As governor of Anambra State, Dr. Mbadiniju was faced with managing difficult relations with the motley crowd of godfathers in the state.
He perhaps never contemplated with the aspiration of one of the rising godfathers, Chief Chris Uba who through his brother, Dr. Andy Uba, now a senator, sought total domination of the political space in the state. Mbadinuju, once an aide of former vice-president Alex Ekwueme, also brought mischief upon himself through what some claimed to be bad governance in the sense of accruals of salaries of civil servants and teachers who went on strike for more than one year.
As the 2003 election got closer, Mbadinuju was in 2002 officially refused the PDP re-election ticket by the national secretariat and he was forced to decamp to the Alliance for Democracy, AD, on whose platform he made an abortive bid for re-election.
Noting his circumstances, at that time, Mbadinuju in an interview with The Nation said:In 2003, after completing my first term, there were two of us, Governor Rabiu kwankwaso of Kano State and I who could not make it back, even though we sought reelection. We were not allowed to go back. This was despite that I had won the primary of my party three times. But the power that-be did not want me back in office.”
“I was penciled down for ambassadorial appointment to Germany. But Obasanjo deleted my name from the list for reasons that were inexplicable. The PDP, after realising that I was wrongly excluded, decided to forward my name for ambassadorial position. That was my fate. The PDP decided to abandon me despite that I remained a loyal member of the party.”
Dr. Chris Ngige
Dr. Chris Ngige who was helped by the national secretariat of the PDP to succeed Mbadiniju, however, fell out with the party after only three months in office. An attempt by a member of the Board of Trustees, BoT Chief Chris Uba to force Ngige into a forced resignation received a backlash in the form of an outpouring of goodwill for the embattled governor even from within the national secretariat of the party.
Dr. Chris Ngige who was helped by the national secretariat of the PDP to succeed Mbadiniju, however, fell out with the party after only three months in office. An attempt by a member of the Board of Trustees, BoT Chief Chris Uba to force Ngige into a forced resignation received a backlash in the form of an outpouring of goodwill for the embattled governor even from within the national secretariat of the party.
The PDP sided with the Ubas against their governor and Ngige became something like an orphan within his own party. Remarkably, Ngige was at that time one of the most tested party administrators having been Assistant National Organising Secretary before he was picked by the Uba brothers for the Anambra project.
The national chairman of the party at that time, Chief Audu Ogbeh was forced into resigning his office partly on account of the crisis triggered by the party’s disowning of Ngige.
In a comment on the episode, Ogbeh said:
“I did what I thought was best because at that time, I had ample information that they were going to kill Ngige before Christmas 2004 and that was the subject of my letter,” Ogbeh said with respect to his controversial letter to President Obasanjo on the party’s hounding of Ngige.
“I did what I thought was best because at that time, I had ample information that they were going to kill Ngige before Christmas 2004 and that was the subject of my letter,” Ogbeh said with respect to his controversial letter to President Obasanjo on the party’s hounding of Ngige.
Senator Rasheed Ladoja
Senator Rasheed Ladoja came to office on the goodwill of the apostle of amala politics, Chief Lamidi Adedibu, who for some still undecipherable reasons had been promoted by President Olusegun Obasanjo as the point-man of the party in the Southwest.
Senator Rasheed Ladoja came to office on the goodwill of the apostle of amala politics, Chief Lamidi Adedibu, who for some still undecipherable reasons had been promoted by President Olusegun Obasanjo as the point-man of the party in the Southwest.
However, following his inauguration in May 2003, Ladoja sought to minimize the influence of Adedibu in the governance of the state and tighten the outflow of state patronage towards Adedibu.
The governor was seriously resisted and Adedibu in cahoots with state institutions and the national party moved against Adedibu.
Ladoja was impeached on 12 January, 2006 by 14 members of the House of Assembly whose number fell short of the 18 required under the law by the 32 member House of Assembly to impeach a governor.
Remarkably, the PDP through its National Publicity Secretary at that time, Mr. John Odey upheld the illegality albeit for political considerations.
The impeachment was eventually upturned by the higher courts and by the time Ladoja returned to office, his deputy who did not waste time in kowtowing to the PDP had already been drafted as the party’s nominee for the 2007 gubernatorial election.
Boni Haruna
Boni Haruna was before his emergence as governor of Adamawa State, a staff in a media company owned by Atiku Abubakar. Atiku eventually chose him as his running mate in the 1999 gubernatorial election which they won.
Boni Haruna was before his emergence as governor of Adamawa State, a staff in a media company owned by Atiku Abubakar. Atiku eventually chose him as his running mate in the 1999 gubernatorial election which they won.
However, luck smiled on Haruna when Atiku was chosen to become vice-presidential candidate by Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.
As governor, Haruna’s loyalty to Atiku remained steadfast even as a staff, and it was no surprise that as the hawks around Obasanjo pummeled Atiku in the run up to the 2007 general election that Haruna suffered collateral damage.
Haruna was forced to abandon the PDP for the then Action Congress in 2006 and claimed that he was hounded out of the party.
In an interview with Vanguard in 2007, Haruna said that it would have been foolish of him to remain in the party given what he claimed as the antagonism of the party to him claiming that the 2004 tribunal judgment against his 2003 re-election was instigated by the party and the presidency in order to deny Atiku a home base ahead of the 2007 contest.
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