PDP warns aggrieved members to withdraw court cases or face sanctions

By Brendan Umoren

The Peoples Democratic Party has directed all members of the party that instituted court cases against the party to withdraw them or face sanctions.

The deputy national publicity secretary of the PDP, Diran Odeyemi, said in a statement on Thursday that the party considered myriads of cases instituted against it by its members as inimical to the successes it has achieved in the last few years.

The party is apparently disturbed by the ruling against the candidacy of the governorship candidate of the party in Osun, Ademola Adeleke, by a high court in Bwari, Abuja and other outstanding litigations.

Adeleke, a serving senator, was recently declared the winner of September 22 governorship election by the Osun governorship election petition tribunal, which conducted its sittings in Abuja.

But the contest of the party’s governorship ticket for the Osun election by Akin Ogunbiyi has remained an internal concern which had further compounded the challenges of Adeleke.

Ogunbiyi had earlier denied any involvement in the travails of Adeleke at the courts, with particular reference to the Tuesday’s court judgment nullifying his candidature as PDP’s flag bearer in the last governorship election.

Odeyemi however, said any PDP member with genuine interest in the party must not make himself available to be used by elements that wanted to slow down its progress through needless litigation.

“We consider it inimical to our progress as a vibrant political party the myriad of cases instituted against PDP by members who are expected to be part of the concerted efforts towards being the ruling party in Nigeria,” he said.

“We can’t continue to struggle under the yoke of needless litigations when we intend to return to power both at federal level and in other states that are out of control of PDP at the moment.”

Odeyemi reminded members of the decision of the National Executive Council (NEC) to sanction any member, no matter how highly placed, who, through court cases constitute themselves as a cog in the wheel of progress of the party, adding that some members had been expelled from the party in the recent past for same reason.

“We are monitoring situations in Osun, Ekiti, Oyo, Lagos and other states across the country regarding court matters instituted by our members,” he said.

He assured that those aggrieved would get justice using the party’s internal mechanism and not through the court.

Odeyemi reiterated the decision of the PDP to sanction any member who failed to comply with the directive.