Friday 27 January 2012

PDP risking protest votes in Bayelsa

Alhaji Kawu Baraje and Governor Timipre Sylva
With the Bayelsa State governorship poll fast approaching, MIKE ODIEGWU writes that the Peoples Democratic Party’s chances in the election are dimmed by its unresolved crisis
Fear has enveloped the Peoples Democratic Party less than three weeks  to the February 11 governorship election in Bayelsa State. People are worried that the internal crisis rocking the party has yet to be resolved despite the proximity of the election.
Most times, intra-party disagreements no matter its intensity, are resolved by stakeholders to create a more dynamic and stronger bond of unity before facing opponents in a political contest.
But the PDP has allowed its wound to turn into gangrene. The party is in tatters. There is no end in sight to the wrangling which started with the  disqualification of Governor Timipre Sylva from contesting the party’s primary. While the governor’s camp has remained aggrieved fighting against what it believed was injustice, the national leadership of PDP has maintained a posture that the party will win the election with or without Sylva and his loyalists.
Pundits believe that the body language of the party’s national leadership may affect the fortunes of the PDP in the election. Already, signs that all is not well have emerged. Governors elected under the banner of the party boycotted the party’s inauguration of its national campaign committee for the election.
Other prominent constituents of the committee such as members of the National Assembly from the South-South and ministers from the zone shunned the event, which took place at the party’s secretariat on Thursday.  Even the Senate President David Mark and former President Olusegun Obasanjo stayed away from the event which was also aimed at formally presenting the party’s anointed candidate, Mr. Seriake Dickson, to the committee.

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