ENUGU: NWODO GROUP SAYS HARMONISATION ,UNCONSTITUTIONAL

The internal crisis in the Enugu chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has continued to linger.

The newly elected State Executive Committee, said to belong to of the camp of the party's National Chairman, Dr. Okwesilieze Nwodo, has dismissed claims from the Governor Sullivan Chime's group that it turned down the 50-50 sharing formula allegedly recommended by President Goodluck Jonathan as the way out of the crisis.

Speaking to newsmen shortly after the inaugural meeting of the new executive held at the Okpara Avenue party office, the newly elected chairman, Mr. Caesar Ogbonna, said they were not aware of any harmonisation.

'How can somebody be talking of harmonisation when the same party sent a committee to conduct fresh congresses in the state? The Vita Abba group can say what they like but the truth is that they have long been dissolved; if they are INEC that monitored the congress or the national headquarters of the party that ordered a fresh congress then we can listen to what they are saying.

'But the Vita Abba executive has long been dissolved and even before that, they have been in court since 2008 over who is the duly elected chairman of the party in the state. So, he has no right to say whether our congress was right or wrong.

'The president is not INEC; he is not PDP and I know Goodluck as a man who knows the constitution and laws of the party. I am sure he didn't say anything about harmonisation.

How could a president who vowed to ensure a free and fair election have talked about harmonisation when it is not in the PDP constitution?

'And at the same time the party sent a committee for the congress and INEC monitored it; the president did not call or write anybody; so we aspired and the people voted for us and we emerged as the new executives of the party from the ward to state levels.'

Ogbonna said his executive would run an open government that would accommodate everybody. 'The governor is welcome, Vita Abba and his former executives are also welcome on board; we shall also go all out to reconcile the party in the state into one big family.'

He explained that the party in the state was ready for the earlier scheduled primary for House of Assembly aspirants in the state but for a directive from the national headquarters of the party. 'We have all delegates and ward executives in place for the primary and whenever the signal comes we shall go ahead with the primary.'

The Governor Chime's faction of PDP, Enugu State, had dismissed the recently conducted congresses by the Nwodo faction, describing it as an exercise in futility and disobedient to the directive of President Jonathan and other top Party stakeholders.

A press statement issued Dr. Okey Eze, publicity secretary of the governor's group noted that there was a directive that the congresses be suspended for both parties to harmonise the party structure in the state.