We ’ll overcome crisis in PDP, defeat APC in 2019 elections, say Makarfi, Dickson

The Peoples DemocraticParty (PDP) Interim National Chairman, Senator Ahmed Makarfi and the Governor of Bayelsa State, Seriake Dickson, have said that the PDP would overcome the challenges of internal crisis rocking the party and reclaim power from the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2019.

Makarfi, former governor of Kaduna State, who gave highlights on plans to resuscitate the party when he received the governor at his residence in Kaduna at the weekend, also said that all hands were now on deck to rebrand the PDP as efforts had been geared towards ensuring unity among the warring leaders in the party.

Governor Dickson, who is also the Chairman of the PDP reconciliation committee met with Makarfi in a closed-door meeting where they exchanged notes on the progress made so far to ensure that all the PDP leaders in dispute bury their hatchets and join hands together in producing credible materials for the party towards the 2019 elections.

Makarfi, who expressed confidence that the PDP would bounce back to greatness, commended the efforts of Dickson and his committee members in reconciling aggrieved members. He stressed the need for members to come together and move the party forward ahead of 2019.

The former governor, who used the occasion on behalf of other caretaker committee members to apologise to all aggrieved members of the party, said that litigation might only give temporal “legal victory”, pointing out that “it certainly cannot give permanent peace to the party as one family.”

On his part, the Bayelsa State governor told Makarfi that all the governors under the party were behind his leadership.

Dickson, who referred to Makarfi as “our leader”, congratulated the former governor on his emergence as the national chairman of the party, adding that his emergence was as a result of his track records.

He said Nigerians needed the party and that the PDP would come strong in 2019.

The governor said: “I am here to consult with our national chairman who is one of the respected leaders of the party and of our country on the way forward for our country. I want to use this opportunity to congratulate him on his emergence as the national chairman.

“I am here in my capacity as chairman of the reconciliation committee of our party, and all leaders and party men and women need to put aside ego personal differences and put the interest of our party before any other thing.

“Mr. Chairman, let me tell you what you already know. All your governors are behind you and I in my capacity as chairman of the national reconciliation committee had been in touch with leaders of our party across the length and breath of our country and one thing everybody says is that with our national chairman, our party has got it right.”

He, therefore, called on aggrieved PDP members to refrain from seeking legal redress but instead seek political solutions to the crisis in the party.