Posted by By TAIWO AMODU on
Following the formal hand over of the party affairs by the outgoing national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Audu Ogbeh, loyalists of president Olusegun Obasanjo ....
Following the formal hand over of the party affairs by the outgoing national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Audu Ogbeh, loyalists of president Olusegun Obasanjo within both the National Executive Committee (NEC) and the party national working committee (CWC) have pencilled down the national Vice Chairman of the party in South-West, Chief Bode George, for the exalted office at the PDP national convention scheduled for November.
Ogbeh formally handed over to the party's Deputy National Chairman (North), Alhaji Ibrahim Safana, on Wednesday during the party National Working Committee (NWC) meeting in Abuja.
Saturday Sun source at the meeting disclosed that Safana would preside over the party for two weeks, after which another Northerner would be mandated to run out Ogbeh's term, until Novermber when the party's national convention would hold.
While admitting that other top shots of the party might have their choice candidates Saturday Sun source submitted that Bode Geoge is the anointed candidate of president Obasanjo and his choice is supposed to be endorsed at the next meeting.
He simultaneously offerred reasons to justify the nomination of the retired naval chief by the Obasanjo caucus within the party.
'The South-West is not in contention for the 2007 presidency. By 2007, President Obasanjo, from the south-west would have spent eight-years of two terms. You recall that the president himself has declared that his zone is foreclosed from the 2007 race.
Saturday Sun source also described the concession of the national chairman ship shot of the party to the South-West as a 'compensation for its appreciable impact" in the zone.
'Chief Bode George, along with other PDP stalwarts in the south-west, have successfully foisted the PDP flag in the zone. He has been able to move the party from zero-governor point to a position where we can boast of controlling five states in the south-west".
Speaking further, our source described the South-west of the PDP under the leadership of the retired naval chief, 'as the most organized and mainfesting the discipline that the party passionately longs for at this crucial period".
They hold their zonal meetings regularly with their governors and ministers in full attendance. They also compel the President to attend. It is also to the credit of the zone that internal wranglings are promptly addressed, unlike in other zones where it degenerates into a national embrassment. South-west zone is the most cohesive", Saturday Sun source submitted further.
He said much of the credit for this monumental groth goes to the tireless effor of the former Military Governor of Ondo State