I’m the right candidate for PDP chairmanship, says Gulak

FORMER Special Adviser on Political Matters, Ahmed Gulak has called on the Board Of Trustee (BOT) and members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to immediately elect him or any candidate from the North-East geo-political zone as a substantive national chairman to replace the embattled former chairman, Chief Uche Secondus, who was sacked by the court last December.

Gulak, who served under the immediate past president, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, said at a press conference in Abuja yesterday that the court gave 14 days within which the party should either appoint him or any other person from the North-East geo-political zone as the acting chairman.

Gulak had filed a suit on November 11, 2015 through his lawyer, Mr. Jibrin S. Okutepa, SAN, challenging the emergence of Secondus as the interim leader of the party, arguing that he (Gulak) was the proper person to fill the position made vacant by the resignation of the former PDP Chairman, Adamu Muazu, who hails from the North East geopolitical zone.

According to him, “Fourteen days from the date of judgment expired on December 29, 2015. As it is today, the party has no properly constituted organ. The National Executive Council (NEC), the National Working Council (NWC) and the national caucus is to, by the constitution of our party, must at all times, every time, be chaired by a national chairman or acting chairman. As it is today, we don’t have national chairman and we don’t have acting chairman even with the court order.

“We have also written the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on the position of the law and the court viz a viz the NWC of our party the PDP. I will give you copies of our letter to INEC and the certificate of judgment declaring Uche Secondus’ acting chairman as illegal, self-serving, null and void, and within 14 days to appoint me as the national chairman or any other person from the North-East. Now, 14 days have elapsed on December 29, 2015,” he said.

Explaining why he has not yet resumed at the PDP’s Secretariat, Gulak said, “The party as an office is on vacation until January 11, or 15, and as such, the Wadata Plaza, the party’s secretariat has been under lock and key.”

When asked if he intended to enforce the court ruling, Gulak said, “We did not go to court as jokers. We went to court because we are serious minded people. We went to court because we believe the constitution of the party must be complied with. We went to court to seek redress and if the court has given judgment and has ordered, definitely, we are going to seek any other legal means to bring whoever is contemptuous of the court order. We will do everything necessary to ensure that the rule of law operates. All court orders must be carried out until it is reversed maybe, on appeal.”

Justice Hussein Baba of the Federal High Court Abuja had in a judgment on December 16, 2015, ordered Secondus to vacate the chairmanship seat of the PDP, and to within the next two weeks, hand over the leadership of the party to Gulak (the plaintiff) or any other member of the PDP from the North-East, competent to pilot the affairs of the party in an acting capacity.