The People’s Democratic Party Governors Forum has endorsed President Goodluck Jonathan for second term.
The chairman of the forum and governor of Akwa Ibom, Godswill Akpabio, disclosed late Monday night that the forum was committed to ensuring Jonathan’s election victory in 2015.
Akpabio was speaking to State House journalists after a two-hour closed door meeting Jonathan held with the forum and the House of Representatives caucus of the PDP.
Our correspondent reports that the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal was absent at the meeting attended by his deputy Emeka Ihedioha and House Leader Mulikat Akande-Adeola.
The meeting, held at the new Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja, was attended by PDP National Chairman Adamu Mu’azu as well as the governors of Bayelsa, Enugu, Abia, Akwa Ibom, Jigawa, Ebonyi, Delta, Benue, Kebbi, Gombe, Bauchi and Katsina States; and the deputy governors of Niger and Sokoto States.
On whether the meeting endorsed Jonathan’s second term bid; Akpabio said: “The PDP Governor’s Forum were present when the NASS caucus did what they did, I don’t want to pre-empt the action of PDP governors, but I can attest to their loyalty and their commitment to the success of Mr. President come 2015″.
He said Jonathan was yet to declare whether or not he is contesting the 2015 presidency because of the need to wait for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) guidelines.
He said though Jonathan was elated over his second term endorsement by the National Assembly caucus of the party, he (the president) did not respond to the call on him to seek re-election because the electoral body has not yet released election timetable.
“As you know, INEC has not given the timetable for election yet, we’re still waiting for INEC to release the guidelines. So, Mr. President didn’t give anybody any answer, he didn’t say he would contest or he wouldn’t contest; but rather, he thanked them (NASS caucus) for the interest and confidence reposed in him. But I think from his body language, he’s very mindful of the law and the need to wait for guidelines from INEC. That was what I noticed”, Akpabio said.
He said the meeting discussed how the PDP could deepen its internal democracy, especially on how to conduct primaries, ahead of the 2015 general elections.
He said the meeting applauded the vote of confidence passed on the president by the National Assembly caucus of the party, adding that his colleagues were also witnessed the call by the caucus on Jonathan to seek re-election.
“Then after we moved into a further meeting with Mr. President and all the PDP governors and members of the NWC led by the National Chairman of the party. Based on the fact that in the next few months, we shall be going into major primaries, so we want to deepen internal democracy and want to strategise on how best we can win the primaries and by implication, also ensure that we bring out the best candidates, taking a cue from what had happened in Ekiti.
“If we’re able to carry out proper internal democracy and bring out the most popular candidates, the main elections will be less rancorous and of course, the party will sail through with a view to getting up two-thirds of the states of the federation as it was in 1999. When I came in, there was a period the PDP had up to 29 governors. In 2011,
we still had up to 25 governors and then of course some governors tried to decamp to other political parties, but we’re gaining more.
Now, we’ve at least 19 governors with the coming of Ekiti State and we also have three deputy governors still with us. Those of Sokoto, Adamawa and Nasarawa bring our number to about 22.
“So, if we shoot to 28, it’s not too bad in the 2015 elections, so it was an appraisal and for us to use that opportunity as PDP governors to congratulate the party leader on the very successful election that was held in Ekiti State which was very free and fair and applauded by the international community and all Nigerians to a point where even the candidates of the opposition described the victory”, Akpabio said.