Saraki reveals real reason PDP is in a mess

Former Senate President Bukola Saraki has traced the problems bedeviling the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to the party’s failure to heed  his  warning.

He said the party is in a mess because his warning against the Ibadan national convention was ignored by the Turaki faction.

He said the convention has  now worsened the crisis in the party.

“I screamed, I shouted at that time, and said, ‘Look, don’t let us go and do this convention. The best thing for us at this point in time is let us have a caretaker committee,” Saraki who headed the PDP reconciliation committee prior to the  Ibadan convention said on Channels Television on Thursday.

He added:“I made a statement. There was a special committee set up. They came and I told them my advice is that we should not go to that convention.

”We should have a caretaker committee because it was clearly the best solution for us, and that if we did that, we would have avoided this issue of different factions. Unfortunately, they did not heed that advice.

“The purpose of going to Ibadan for any convention was for everybody to be on board and agree on what we were going to do when we got there, and meet all the criteria that had been demanded.

“There was the issue of congresses in some states that had not been conducted. There were also talks about who should take which positions across the zones. So, when you go to those conventions, it should be affirmation—you should have resolved issues behind the scenes.

“We said, ‘Don’t go to Ibadan. Don’t go to that convention’. There was no point going. Instead, let us form a caretaker committee. If we had done that, we would not have this crisis.

“Before that, we were not in court. There were not these kinds of cases against different parts of the party until after the Ibadan convention.”

Saraki hinted yesterday that he would be part of tomorrow’s convention.

He confirmed on his Facebook wall that he received a delegation led by Alhaji Abdulrahman Mohammed ahead of the convention.

He said:”As we prepare for the Official Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Nigeria National Convention this Sunday, I received members of the National Caretaker Working Committee this evening, led by Chairman Abdulrahman Mohammed, alongside the Caretaker Legal Adviser, Kamaldeen Adeyemi Ajibade, SAN, who came by to appreciate the role I’ve played in the ongoing reconciliation efforts within our party.”