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Tag: Sambo

  • Sambo reconciles aggrieved Kebbi PDP chieftains

    Sambo reconciles aggrieved Kebbi PDP chieftains

    Vice President Namadi Sambo has reconciled aggrieved members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), who have protested the outcome of governorship and National Assembly primaries in Kebbi State.

    Sambo, who held peace meetings with the chieftains in Birnin-Kebbi, the state capital, advised them to bury their differences and work for the success of the party at the polls.

    The Vice President , who spoke with reporters after the meeting, assured that peace has returned to the chapter.

    He said: “After the meeting with PDP stakeholders and all the aspirants in the state, we have now reconciled and the aspirants have agreed to work toward the progress of the party.

    “All the aspirants have won the election as none will be left alone. We would give every member a true sense of belonging.”

    Sambo praised the Federal Government for its development efforts nationwide, stressing that it has provided six states with standard airports.

    He commended Governor Saidu Dakingari for improving the education sector, adding that the healthcare policy of the state government had improved health care delivery, especially for women and children.

    He said the establishment of a  federal university in the state has demonstrated government’s determination to improve tertiart education.

    The Vice President promised that the Federal Government would establish a rice processing mill in the state, in recognition of the state government’s efforts to boost commercial production.

    Sambo added: “President Goodluck Jonathan has directed me to extend his gratitude to PDP members in the state for their cooperation and amicable resolution of disputes.’’

    Dakingari commended the Vice President for resolving the crisis in the party.

    He called on PDP members to work toward the development of the party.

    The governor promised that efforts would be intensified to ensure victory for the party in the general elections.

    He said: “If we remain united and work together, we would defeat the opposition.”

    The PDP governorship candidate, Gen. Bello Sarkin-Yaki, promised to work closely with aspirants, who contested with him in the primaries.

    He also enjoined members to workd for the success of the party at the polls.

  • Sambo, Ihedioha, other House leaders meet at Aso Rock

    Sambo, Ihedioha, other House leaders meet at Aso Rock

    Vice President Namadi Sambo on Thursday met behind closed doors with the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Emeka Ihedioha and some leaders of the House at the State House, Abuja.

    Crisis erupted on Thursday when members of the National Assembly were prevented from entering the National Assembly premises by the Nigeria Police Force.

    Among those at the meeting with the vice president are the House Leader, Adeola Akande and Deputy House Leader, Leo Ogor.

    They declined to speak with State House correspondents at the end of the meeting.

  • ‘Sambo not a liability’

    ‘Sambo not a liability’

    An Abuja-based civil society organisation, Initiative for Promotion of Civil Obligations and Sustainable Peace has said that Vice President Mohammed Namadi Sambo is not only an asset to the present government, but a true northern leader who deserves everyone’s support.

    Addressing a news conference in Abuja, chairman of the organisation, Daniel Nkpanam and Secretary, Danjuma Bello Sarki said recent campaigns against the Vice President were mounted to disparage and discredit him.

    While reacting to a recent statement credited to the deposed Emir of Gwandu, Mustapha Jokolo that the Vice President was a political liability to the President, the group said that Sambo and President Jonathan have enjoyed a cordial working relationship unrivalled in the history in the history of democracy in the country.

    They said the level of confidence reposed on the Vice President by President Jonathan has seen him undertake series of assignments which has yielded positive results.

    They said that “The President and his Vice have been enjoying a cordial working relationship since the inception of their administration which is no doubt second to none since the advent of the current democratic dispensation. So, it would be foolhardy for a spent force like Jokolo to attempt to use this as an opportunity to bounce back into reckoning in our nation.

    “For Jokolo to claim that the Vice President is a liability to the President and is not fit to run with him in the 2015 General election has exposed his level of mischief against the Presidency and sheer ignorance of the art of governance or it is an attempt to truncate the sustainable peace and mutual trust existing between Jonathan and Sambo so as to enthrone anarchy and distrust.

    “The President and his Vice are obviously a perfect and divine combination. The mutual understanding between them is what had translated into the successes of the transformation agenda, thereby putting smiles on the faces of Nigerians.

    “It is no longer news that all assignments assigned to the Vice President by the President are being discharged effectively. This is evident in the achievements of the committees he chaired which gave birth to SURE P which today is greatly empowering our teeming youths, providing remarkable infrastructure and drastically reducing unemployment in our nation.

    “The power sector reform committee that engineered the successful privatisation of the sector which has since improved power supply to Nigerian homes was also piloted by the Vice President. These are just few amongst many of his impact full contributions to the development of our country.

    “Also based on the confidence revised on the Vice President by the President, he recently approved the sum if 220 billion naira under his leadership for small and medium scale enterprises development in addition to the task of creating 2 million jobs in collaboration with t he private sector.

    “We want to state categorically that Arch. Namadi Sambo is an asset and a leader not NLC to the north, bit to Nigeria as a whole and only second to the President. We call on Nigerians to be mindful of the fact that when you disparage or dishonor the office of the President or the Vice President, you are not only denigrating the holder of the office, but the image of our nation.

    “We urge all Nigerians to disregard the deposed Emir,his likes and his sponsors, but continue to rally the required support for the President and his Bice as they strive towards achieving the targets of the transformation agenda”.

     

  • Sambo, Sultan, others for Ahmadu Bello’s book launch

    Sambo, Sultan, others for Ahmadu Bello’s book launch

    VICE President Namadi Sambo, former Minister of Defence, Gen. T. Y. Danjuma, Sultan of Sokoto Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar and other northern leaders are expected to attend the official launch of a book written in honour of the late Premier of Northern Region Sir Ahmadu Bello.

    The book, which is written in Hausa Language with the title, “Babbar-Runfa,” will be launch on Thursday at Trade Fair Complex, in Kaduna.

    The author, Alhaji Salihu Abdullahi Jarman Komo, who spoke to reporters in Kaduna yesterday, said the book took him about 12 years to complete.

    According to the author, the lifestyle of the late premier, which he believes was worthy of emulation, propelled him to write the book.

    He said the late premier was a very important personality, which Nigeria should never forget his contributions towards its development, particularly in the North.

  • 2015: Jonathan, Sambo, Mark in crucial meeting with Muazu

    2015: Jonathan, Sambo, Mark in crucial meeting with Muazu

    There was anxiety yesterday following the recession into a closed door meeting by President Goodluck Jonathan, Vice-President Namadi Sambo and President of the Senate, David Mark with National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Adamu Mu’azu.

    The Presidential delegation drove to Mu’azu’s residence in Asokoro District for the session.

    The meeting might be connected with the 2015 presidential poll of which the President was yet to make an official declaration.

    As at 8.36pm, all the leaders were still in Mu’azu’s residence for what a source described as a “crucial session.”

    Soldiers took over all the roads leading to Mu’azu’s residence.

  • Sambo, Mark, others welcome Mimiko back into PDP

    Sambo, Mark, others welcome Mimiko back into PDP

    ONDO State Governor Olusegun Mimiko defected yesterday to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from the Labour Party (LP).

    He and his supporters were received back to the fold by Vice President Namadi Sambo, Senate President David Mark, Deputy National Chairman Uche Secondus and other top party men at the Banquet Hall of the State House, Abuja.

    Mimiko said he left the party eight years ago when internal democracy within the party shrank.

    Noting that he has no particular office to run for in 2015, he said that he returned to the PDP to support President Goodluck Jonathan’s re-election next year.

    Narrating what warranted his leaving the PDP, Mimiko said: “Unfortunately at some point in the party’s history, that room for democracy got greatly conscripted. Thus some eight years ago, when we needed to run for office and the space for internal democracy within PDP had considerably shrank, we chose to leave. But then, not to align with the then emergent opposition party in the land, the ACN.

    “Rather, we chose to move away from both and pick up Labour Party (LP), a party that was quite modest in its aspirations for national elective offices and completely unknown in Ondo State where we wanted to run for office.

    “Precisely on December 14, 2006, we publicly announced LP as our choice of platform. To the glory of God, four months later, in the April 14, 2007 election, we got the mandate of our people to govern Ondo State. Although our election was stolen by the political tendency in power in Abuja at the time. Thanks to a judiciary that continues to be profoundly alert to its duty in a democracy, we managed to retrieve our mandate two years later.

    “Today, just barely one year into our second term in office, it is obvious that we do not have any office to run for either now or in 2015.”

    He said he therefore decided to help in getting President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan elected.

    The Vice President, in his reaction, said: “Your coming back home is highly and deeply appreciated. I have no word to truly describe our feelings of your homecoming. We are confident that with your coming, the issues in the Southwest have been concluded.”

    He directed the Deputy National Chairman to put machinery in place for PDP rally in Akure, Ondo State, to receive more members to the party.

    The Senate President was confident that Mimiko’s return to the party would add value to the party at all level.

    He urged Mimiko to reconcile every party member in the area to eliminate factional camps, even as he tasked all PDP members to receive him with open hand.

    The Ondo State All Progressives Congress (APC) also got more members into its fold yesterday.

    Over 2,000 Labour Party (LP) and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members yesterday at Ore in Odigbo Local Government Area dumped their parties and decided to pitch their tents with the APC.

  • Jonathan, Sambo and the 2015 ticket

    With all the organs of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) declaring President Goodluck Jonathan the sole Presidential candidate of  the party for the 2015 general elections, the decision to pick his running mate is said to be the exclusive right of  the President.

    The sole candidacy declared for Jonathan was said to only cover him and not his Vice, Namadi Sambo.

    For this reason, many politicians interested in the number two job have continued to make clandestine moves to lobby for the post.

    Many of them are believed to be scheming to take charge in 2019 when Jonathan’s tenure will elapse should he get another term in 2015.

    Some of them have begun testing the waters with posters flooding Abuja and many parts of the country showing them as probable running mates to President Jonathan.

    A case in point is the poster showing the PDP National Chairman, Adamu Muazu as the running mate to Jonathan, which took over Abuja streets as soon as Jonathan was declared sole candidate of  the party a forthnight ago.

    Muazu has not disowned or disassociated himself  from the posters, a week after they flooded Abuja.

    If he has nothing to do with it, political watchers expect Muazu to announce to the public that the posters were the handiwork of his detractors. This was yet to be done as at Thursday last week.

    Another allegation has it that Jigawa State Governor; Sule Lamido shelved his Presidential ambition to settle for the number two job under the party.

    But what is being thrown up against Sambo, who many believed has been very loyal and instrumental to all the achievements recorded by Jonathan in the past four years, was the allegation that he has a diminished political value and may not be able to deliver the North for Jonathan in 2015.

    Sambo’s loyalty was said to have facilitated smooth running of the administration unlike the ugly experiences recorded in the past.

    As Jonathan is expected to publicly accept the sole candidacy and announce his running-mate in the next few weeks, political watchers are keenly eager to see if Jonathan will place Sambo’s loyalty above every other consideration, or if he will pick other politicians scheming and strategising to take control of the leadership in 2019.

     

  • Sambo leads pro-Jonathan rally in Enugu

    Sambo leads pro-Jonathan rally in Enugu

    Vice-President Mohammed Sambo led a re-election rally for President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday in Enugu.

    The rally, a brainchild of Governor Sullivan Chime, was under the auspices of the Enugu Movement for the Re-Election of Jonathan (EMJ).

    But a prominent indigene and Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu was absent at the rally.

    It was learnt that the senator and the governor have become rivals over who gets a senatorial ticket.

    Businesses, schools and the civil service were shut down yesterday to enable the residents attend the rally.

    Chime said anyone who was not at the rally could not prove his or her support for Jonathan’s re-election, apparently referring to Ekweremadu.

    Sambo said he had confirmed that Enugu State was 100 per cent for Jonathan’s re-election bid.

    The vice-president noted that there would be no need for the President to campaign in the state.

    He hailed Chime for transforming the state.

    The governor explained that the rally was organised to support the Jonathan/Sambo 2015 return to Aso Rock Villa.

    He said: “Our people have demonstrated their support and we are repeating what we said in 2011 that Mr. President should count Enugu out of the states for campaigns. This is because there will be no need for that. As you can see, the whole state has said ‘On Jonathan we stand’.”

    Chime recalled that in 2011, no other presidential candidate campaigned in the state, adding that 2015 would not be different.

    He said: “Any vote against Jonathan in 2015 must be a vote in error.”

    Anambra State Governor Willy Obiano said his state supported Jonathan’s re-election.

    He recalled that the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) was the first party to endorse President Jonathan before the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) did.

    Dignitaries at the rally included the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim; the Special Adviser to the President on Political Affairs, Prof. Rufai Ahmed Alkali; old Anambra State Governor Jim Nwobodo, former Senate President Ken Nnamani, Senator Ayogu Eze; former Information Minister Frank Nweke Jnr.; Minister of Power Prof. Chinedu Nebo and business mogul Chief Arthur Eze.

    Also yesterday, a group, Enugu Rescue Group (ERG), criticised Chime for describing Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members who were not at the Enugu rally as opposing Jonathan’s re-election.

    The group was reacting to the statement by the governor who, while addressing the rally organised by the Enugu State Movement for Re-election of President Jonathan said that “whoever is not here could not be said to be supporting President Jonathan”.

    In a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Comrade Martin Okenwa, ERG said Chime was notorious for his anti-Jonathan tendencies.

    It described the Enugu rally as “a damage control from the backlash of the non-support and participation in the Transformation Ambassadors Nigeria (TAN) Southeast rally in Awka, the Anamabra State”.

    The statement reads: “Governor Chime’s comment is an irony because, from the turbulent days of the struggle for the emergence of President Jonathan as the Acting President to the successful efforts spearheaded by TAN to have the PDP adopt Mr. President as its sole candidate, the Enugu State Government and the governor are renowned for their opposition and hide-and-seek games.

    “Not only was Chime the only Southeast PDP governor who refused to collect the TAN registers to mobilise signatures in support of the President, it is also public knowledge that the governor took the State Executive Council and all the local government chairmen to a birthday party in Umuahia (Abia State capital) on the day of the rally attended by all the other PDP Southeast Governors.

    “The Enugu rally was, therefore, a belated damage control and futile attempt to key himself into the Jonathan 2015 re-election having seen that Jonathan had carried the day with his adoption by the PDP as its sole presidential candidate.

    “We see Chime’s comment as an attack on Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu, the same man who moved the important motion and authored the Doctrine of Necessity, both of which snowballed into the Jonathan presidency at a time the governor was hobnobbing with anti-Jonathan forces.”

  • 2015: Sambo part of winning team – PDP

    2015: Sambo part of winning team – PDP

    The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has decried attempts by a section of the media to cause rift between President Goodluck Jonathan and his Vice, Namadi Sambo, ahead of 2015 general election.

    A statement issued in Abuja on Monday by the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Olisa Metuh, expressed the party’s implicit satisfaction in the working relationship between Jonathan and Sambo.

    It restated the overwhelming confidence of the party in a winning team that had transformed Nigeria in less than four years in spite of challenges.

    ‘‘There is no doubt whatsoever that the vice president has the implicit confidence in the president.

    ‘‘The PDP is, therefore, very pleased that they are working together in actualising the transformation agenda to the popular acclaim of both Nigerians and the international community.

    According to the statement, the 66th National Executive Committee meeting of PDP which endorsed Jonathan as the sole candidate of PDP for 2015 presidential election, anchored it on outstanding performance of the “Jonathan presidency.”

    The statement said further that vice president Sambo was an integral part of the “Jonathan presidency.”

    ‘‘This motion, which was unanimously endorsed by NEC left no room for any form of speculation, ‘’ the News Agency of Nigeria quoted the party as saying in the statement.

     

  • Jonathan to determine Sambo’s fate

    Jonathan to determine Sambo’s fate

    •PDP cedes power to pick running mate to President

    The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has given President Goodluck Jonathan the power to pick his running mate after his endorsement by all the party’s organs.

    Vice-President Namadi Sambo’s fate is hanging in the balance —going by this decision.

    The endorsement by the governors, the Board of Trustees (BoT) and the National Executive Committee (NEC), forecloses a Presidential Primary amid speculations about the fate of Vice President Namadi Sambo.

    There was no mention of the Vice President by the organs while endorsing Jonathan.

    But yesterday, the party said Jonathan is free to determine Sambo’s fate.

    National Publicity Secretary Olisa Metuh at a news conference in Abuja yesterday warned party members against what he described as “unhealthy speculations” regarding the choice of Jonathan’s running mate.

    Metuh said: “The President is yet to communicate his acceptance of the endorsement to the party and the nation.

    “We should wait for the President to announce his running mate instead of jumping the gun. I believe the incumbent Vice President enjoys the confidence of the President”.

    A number of prominent chieftains of the party, particularly some serving governors from the Northwest zone, are believed to be jostling to edge out  Sambo.

    The general perception within the party is that Sambo’s electoral value in his Kaduna State base has continued to diminish at an alarming rate, a situation which they believe could adversely affect the party’s electoral fortune in the zone.

    Also, the leadership of the party has given its members nationwide the go ahead to attend the plethora of pro Jonathan rallies, ostensibly being funded by volunteer groups.

    Only last week, the party banned its elected officials from attending such rallies, apparently to detach the leadership from the sponsored rallies.

    Metuh who announced the lifting on the ban also said the party would undertake a nationwide project tour, starting from today.

    According to him, the tour, which would also cover insurgent-ravaged Yobe and Borno States, is meant to showcase the achievements of the party at the local, state and federal levels.

    “Indeed, there is no state, local government or ward in Nigeria that has not been positively affected by projects executed by PDP governments at federal, state and local government levels.

    “Such projects abound in non-PDP states and many Nigerians erroneously give credit to the opposition, which they eagerly accept.

    “Also, in states formerly controlled by the PDP, such as Edo, Rivers, Nasarawa, Kano, Sokoto, Kwara, among others, the opposition parties, now in control are laying claims to our projects.

    “This tour will ‘recover’ our projects claimed by the opposition and return the credit to the PDP.

    “We therefore urge all Nigerians to be part of this laudable project as we catalogue our collective successes under the PDP-led administration.

    “In this regard, we wish to state that as we embark on our performance tours, we will no longer focus on answering to diatribes of the opposition.

    “Our answer to such is that we meet at the polls in 2015. All members of the party are by this directed to comply accordingly”, Metuh said.