THERE were indications on Sunday that governors elected on the ticket of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) may have been asked to prevail on the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr Iyorchia Ayu to consider resigning from office as a compromise over the raging feud in the party on power sharing.
The plan was said to be part of the efforts made at the weekend by some key stakeholders in the party to unite and strengthen the main opposition party ahead of the presidential poll.
But a spokesman of the Atiku campaign team, Senator Dino Melaye, said Ayu would not quit, asserting that the governors were instrumental in Ayu becoming national chairman.
A source however, said the move to drag the governors to prevail on Ayu to quit was a follow-up to the meeting held by the presidential candidate of the PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar with Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State and his allies, including Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State; Seyi Makinde (Oyo) and Dr Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State in the bid to reconcile the two camps that had been at loggerheads after the choice of a running mate by Atiku.
According to sources, the face-off between the two camps is one of the factors delaying the constitution of PDP Presidential Campaign Council for the 2023 general election.
“It has been technically agreed that Ayu should step aside. But whether he will agree to resign or not depends on him,” another source said.
Virtually all the 13 PDP governors are split over the simmering crisis that has engulfed the party, with a few of them openly backing Wike over his agitation.
The source claimed that history was about to repeat itself as he claimed that the Third Republic senator ignored all entries that he should resign as the president of the Senate, following a plot to impeach him during the agitation for the de-annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election won by the late Chief MKO Abiola.
He was eventually impeached by the Senate during the military-induced political crisis.
The source added that the current faceoff is also about unfair power equation along the North/South structure in the PDP and need to allow the spirit of inclusiveness as contained in PDP Constitution to prevail.
But a source said the possibility of the deputy national chairman (South), Ambassador Taofeek Arapaja stepping in as PDP acting national chairman might not be automatic if Ayu bows to the current pressure on him.
This, the source said, was because the position could go to any of the three zones in the South for strategic reasons in the ongoing build-up to the general election.
“The acting chairman could come from the any of the geopolitical zones in the South if Ayu resigns since PDP wants to win convincingly in the general election. This is an unusual time for the party,” the source added.
Meanwhile, an elder of the party say that members of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of PDP plan to meet again within the next one week, as part of the ongoing efforts to end the protracted power struggle between the two blocs.
A member of the BoT, who craved to remain anonymous, said the meeting could come up earlier depending on further developments on the raging crisis.
The chairman of the BoT, Senator Jibril Wakil first broke news about moves to reconcile Atiku and Wike due to the fury expressed by the Rivers governor over the outcome of the PDP presidential primary, in which he came second.