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Tag: Umaru Dikko

  • Umaru Dikko, the ultimate enforcer (1936 – 2014)

    Umaru Dikko, the ultimate enforcer (1936 – 2014)

    He was your quintessential Mr. Fix-It. And like all enforcers, he inspired fear more than love, a fact attested to by his inability, for example, to win the seat of northern Kaduna senatorial district in the old Kaduna State that included his native Zaria.

    He contested for the seat in 1978 on the platform of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), the most conservative of the five parties approved by the regime of Generals Murtala Mohammed/ Olusegun Obasanjo for the transition programme between 1975 and 1979.

    Alhaji Umaru Dikko’s nemesis was a little known Alhaji Ibrahim Barau, a businessman, who contested on the platform of the radical Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) led by Malam Aminu Kano. At the time of the Mohammed/Obasanjo transition programme, Dikko had become a household name, having held several public offices, including commissionerships in the then North-Central State comprising Zaria and Katsina provinces. He was one of the most forceful and outspoken members of the 1977/78 Constituent Assembly (CA).

    It was this well-known Dikko, who died last Tuesday, that Barau, a Bazazzagi like himself, defeated for the seat of northern Kaduna senatorial district. Undeterred, he worked his way into becoming the campaign manager of Alhaji Shehu Shagari, the presidential candidate of the NPN.

    As New Nigerian’s reporter who covered Shagari’s presidential campaign, I could not but marvel at the energy and passion with which Dikko threw himself into the job, often sleeping on the carpeted floor of the campaign office on Victoria Island, Lagos, just to make sure he was always on hand to get things done. He thus became probably the closest confidant of Shagari, bar his friend, Alhaji Isiyaku Ibrahim, the campaign’s principal financier, by the time Shagari emerged the winner.

    It was not surprising therefore that Dikko became the most powerful minister in Shagari’s cabinet as transport minister, eclipsing even more prominent members of the party – at least nominally – like Malam Adamu Ciroma and Saraki, who were presidential aspirants and even party chairman, Chief Adisa Akinloye and Vice-President Alex Ekwueme, in his apparent proximity to Shagari.

    Power, as Dr. Henry Kissinger, America’s most famous Secretary of State in modern times, once reportedly said, is the ultimate aphrodisiac; it attracts as much envy from enemies as it does obsequiousness from admirers. Soon enough Dikko became the target of some of the most vicious attacks, especially in the press, by opposition elements, particularly from the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), whose presidential candidate, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, came a close second to Shagari and lost through a controversial Supreme Court interpretation of what 2/3rd of 19 states were from which a candidate had to score at least a quarter of votes cast before he could be declared winner.

    Shagari met the condition in 12 states whereas 2/3rd of 19 were 12.666 states, a statistical incongruity. UPN insisted the ratio meant 13 states which, in turn, meant there should be a second ballot between its candidate and Shagari. Chief Akinjide, NPN’s legal adviser, thought otherwise and asked the courts to declare Shagari the winner. They did, and thus set the context for the bitter politics of the Second Republic throughout the odd four years it lasted.

    As if Dikko was not powerful enough as transport minister and a Shagari confidant, the president appointed him to chair his committee on rice importation at a time of NPN’s suspicion, justified or otherwise, that the opposition had plans to frustrate its policy of food sufficiency through hoarding. It was as chair of the committee that he made a statement that was to prove a propaganda nightmare for him for the rest of the Second Republic.

    “As long as we are in government,” he had said in defence of the setting up of his committee, “we will leave no stone unturned to ensure that there is sufficient food in Nigeria and nobody will eat from dustbin.” For some not-so-inexplicable reason the opposition press turned the statement on its head and reported the man as saying there was no hunger in the land because no one as yet was eating from dustbins.

    Predictably, this attracted much public opprobrium to the minister and nothing he said thereafter ever convinced the public that he was not an arrogant and insensitive politician.

    It was NPN’s attempt to counter such bad press for itself and for its administration which eventually led to the rise of Chief M.K.O. Abiola as a chieftain of the party, whose foundation member he was. As Dikko himself told it in one of his most definitive interviews in the defunct Citizen (January 31, 1993) as an exile in the UK: “In the NPN, we realised that our greatest obstacle was that we were surrounded by a hostile press, because they did not belong to us at all. Nor were they ready to be objective…As a result of this predicament, people began to say the NPN must have its own paper.”

    It was then, he said in the interview, that Abiola offered to start a newspaper to counter the opposition press. All Abiola said he needed, Dikko said, was “necessary assistance to minimise bureaucracy,” which he got. Besides, Dikko said, even the name of the newspaper, National Concord, was Shagari’s suggestion. “This,” he said, “was something I know and Abiola knows that I know.”

    However, he said in effect, speculations that NPN funded the establishment of the newspaper were not true. “Everything was made easy for him. Where he got his money to start it, I don’t know. Only he knows.”

    Any observer of Nigeria’s political scene during the Second Republic would agree that the opposition press more than met their match in the Concord.  Staffed with some of the smartest and well motivated brains in Nigerian journalism, Abiola’s newspapers took the battle to the enemy’s territory, giving Nigerians exposes like the Maroko land scandal which implicated Chief Awolowo in damaging allegations of land grab from the poor.

    Apparently Concord’s success led Abiola to the conclusion that he deserved a seat in NPN’s inner sanctum. First, he sought to be its chairman, a job Akinloye was holding much, it seemed, to the satisfaction of the party establishment. Key members of this establishment, Dikko in particular, were apparently not amused by Abiola’s attempt to replace Akinloye. They did everything to frustrate Abiola’s bid and succeeded.

    Undeterred, Abiola next sought to vie for the party’s presidential ticket against the 1983 elections. Once again the party establishment blocked him. Worse, Dikko went on to deride the chief by making his now famous statement that the NPN’s presidential ticket was “not for sale to the highest bidder,” or some words to that effect.

    An angry Abiola left the party and not only took his newspaper with him. He joined it with the opposition press in their war which sought to portray NPN as bad for Nigeria and Dikko, specifically, as the chief villain of the Second Republic.

    It seems his image as the Bad Boy of the Second Republic left its mark even among his fellow party men. For, when he sought to replace Alhaji Shehu Ahmadu Musa as the highly respected Secretary of the Government of the Federation, probably as payback for engineering Shagari’s “landslide” victory in the 1983 presidential election, his principal demurred. Instead the president appointed him a Minister for Special Duties, which looked more or less like being shunted sideways from his previous powerful position.

    It was as Minister for Special Duties that he fled into self-exile in the UK when the soldiers overthrew the Second Republic on December 31, 1983, barely three months into Shagari’s second term. In exile, he quickly became the most outspoken critic of the new military regime under General Muhammadu Buhari.

    The regime soon returned Dikko’s compliment; short of exactly saying so, it declared him the most wanted politician among the exiles. It wanted him so badly it quickly bought a proposal by Lt-General T. Y. Danjuma, to date the most powerful army chief, to kidnap and return him to Nigeria for trial as allegedly one of the country’s most corrupt ministers, if not the most corrupt. This was according to Buhari’s Aide de Camp, Major Mustapha Jokolo, in a paid eight-page advert in Citizen (November 9, 1992) which none of the principal actors Jokolo mentioned ever contested.

    In the advert which he entitled “A soldier’s soldier or a soldier of fortune?”, Jokolo said Danjuma’s motivation was to settle scores with Dikko for shutting down all private jetties in the country, including Danjuma’s, because of information he had as transport minister that many of them were being used for smuggling.

    One day, Jokolo said, the former army chief rang him to book for an appointment to see Buhari. “He made his proposals which sounded attractive. He said he could bring Umaru Dikko back using his Israeli connections.”

    Jokolo’s claim has since been corroborated by former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida, in his definitive 2012 biography, IBRAHIM BABANGIDA: The Military, Politics and Power in Nigeria, by veteran journalist Dan Agbese. Babangida was Buhari’s army chief before he overthrew his boss in a bloodless palace coup in August 1985.

    According to Agbese, Babangida said the initiative actually came from the Israelis who sold it to a retired general who Dan did not name but who, obviously, was Danjuma. Danjuma, in turn sold it to Babangida who in turn sold it to Buhari but eventually took no part in its execution. The Israelis demanded $10 million for the job.

    It is not clear if the amount was paid but, as we all now know, their attempt to execute the job in broad daylight in front of Dikko’s house on the streets of London on July 4, 1984, failed and the Dikko Affair, as it was dubbed by the media, led to a break in diplomatic ties between Nigeria and Britain.

    Perhaps it was the trauma of being crated alive in the bungled kidnap attempt, but Dikko vowed never to return to Nigeria as long as the military remained in power. He kept his vow even after some of his partners in self-exile like Chief Joseph Wayas, the Senate president, Alhaji Uba Ahmed, NPN’s general secretary, and Dr Chuba Okadigbo, one of Shagari’s top aide, returned at various times to participate in Babangida’s long transition politics between 1985 and 1993.

    When he returned in the end and joined the political fray by eventually forming his own party, he made little impact. The long exile, it seemed, had taken the fire which made him perhaps the most powerful minister during the Second Republic out of his belly.

    For someone whose enemies liked to paint as one of Nigeria’s most corrupt politicians, Dikko died in relative poverty. The fact, however, was that even though he was a power freak, he never used it to amass wealth for himself, a fact which seemed apparent from his modest residence in Kaduna even during the height of his power.

    May Allah forgive his transgressions and reward his good deeds with aljanna firdaus.

     

     

     

     

  • Umaru Dikko buried in Zaria

    Umaru Dikko buried in Zaria

    The Second Republic Minister of Transport, Dr. Umaru Dikko, who died at his London residence last week, was finally buried in Zaria on Tuesday after a funeral prayer at the palace of the Emir of Zazzau, Alhaji Shehu Idris.

    The corpse of the late Dikko, who was the Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party disciplinary committee,  arrived his Kaduna residence in the early hours of Tuesday, where it was received by family members before being conveyed to Zaria on the Emir’s request.

    The corpse was slated to arrive Nigeria last Thursday, but failed to arrive due to what family sources described as logistic reasons. But unconfirmed reports said the British Home Office refused to release the remains, until the Federal Government intervened.

    Shortly after the funeral prayers, the corpse was conveyed to Zaria  for interment, while the burial was almost marred by heavy downpour. Dikko was buried at about 2.20pm.

    The Chief Imam of Zaria, Alhaji Mohammadu Sani led the funeral prayer which was attended by the Emir of Zauzau and the Secretary to the Kaduna State Government, Alhaji Hamza Isaq Danmahawayi, who represented the state governor, Mukthar Ramalan Yero.

  • Umaru Dikko (1936 – 2014)

    Umaru Dikko (1936 – 2014)

    •A spectacular conservative politician departs

    Without doubt, the most spectacularly dramatic event in the life of Umaru Dikko, who served as Minister of Transport in President Shehu Shagari’s cabinet between 1979 and 1983, must be his attempted abduction in London, apparently by agents of the military regime that terminated Nigeria’s Second Republic.

    Dikko, a highly visible and influential member of the defunct National Party of Nigeria (NPN), had fled into exile following the military coup of December 31, 1983, that toppled the Shagari civilian administration; but he was fiercely hunted by the new rulers who accused him of colossal official corruption and involvement in the looting of millions of dollars from the country’s oil earnings.

    It is a reflection of his perceived political weight at the time that, about six months later, he was sensationally seized in front of his home, sedated and put  in a crate headed for Lagos, which was then the country’s capital. But for the alertness of officials at Stansted Airport, he would have been flown to Nigeria as “Diplomatic Baggage.”  This severely shocking incident, aptly called the ‘Dikko Affair’, happened in July 1984.

    Remarkably, Dikko’s death at the age of 78 in a London hospital on July 1 coincided with the 30th anniversary of the failed kidnap. He had returned to politics and was, until his death, Chairman of the Disciplinary Committee of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which was an eloquent testimony to his conservative political tendency.

    Unapologetically northern, even to the point of promoting northern hegemony, Dikko was combatively outspoken and played politics with striking passion.  His earliest governmental role was as a commissioner in the then North Central State of Nigeria (now Kaduna State) in the 1960s; and he was also given the politically significant assignment of uniting the northerners as secretary of a committee set up by the military government in the aftermath of a coup in 1966.  He was later appointed as Shagari’s strategist for the NPN’s successful presidential campaign, and combined his subsequent ministerial role with his function as head of the presidential task force on rice.

    Interestingly, posthumous tributes, particularly from high-profile quarters, defined Dikko’s legacy and helped in evaluating him as a public figure.  President Goodluck Jonathan, in a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, noted Dikko’s “significant contributions, especially his life-long advocacy for stronger political parties, greater discipline within political parties and the supremacy of political parties.” Really, in the context of the country’s current experience which reflects increasing centrifugal stress within political parties, there may be valuable lessons to be learnt from Dikko’s perspective.

    Further characterisation of the late politician, provided by Gen. Yakubu Gowon, a former military head of state, was instructive for its apparent revisionism, which may have been understandably informed by the general notion that it is indecent to speak ill of the dead.  Gowon said: “It was not his character to be what newspapers made him to be.” He added, “His death is a great loss to the country no matter what anyone will say.”  However, the point must be made that it smacks of insincerity to suggest that the media’s reportage of the man was fabricated.

    Indeed, against the background of the publicised lavish orientation of leading members of the NPN, he could be said to be blemished, even if only by association. Furthermore, Dikko’s reemergence in the PDP, with its similarly conservative hue and perhaps even greater profligacy, was sufficient in comprehending not only his political philosophy but also his understanding of good governance.

    Colourful but controversial, it is enlightening that his political career was not such that could be described as people-oriented, given the seemingly elitist platforms he promoted. The parties he appeared to love were those with low progressive content; and he remained faithful to his choice till the end.

  • Death of a power baron

    Death of a power baron

    His last partisan assignment was as controversial as his entire political career. The crisis in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had reached the peak. The party was not looking for a crisis manager, but an enforcer of discipline.

    The lot to chair the party’s National Disciplinary Committee fell on Dr. Umaru Dikko in the twilight of his life. It was a very difficult task for the foremost conservative politician. The committee never accomplished its objective.

    When it was inaugurated in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, reality dawned on the ruling party that the Second Republic Minister of Transport was the wrong choice for the job. He was not hale and hearty. On his seat, he looked frail, pale and pensive. When he tried to muster the strength of his defunct robust youthful years, his energy failed him. Few weeks after the inauguration, he was said to have travelled abroad for medical attention.

    Dikko had been around for long. Controvery trails his interventions in national life. In the seventies, he served as a commissioner in the old Kaduna State. He was a founding member of the defunct National Party of Nigeria (NPN), the notorious party that brought him into prominence.

    In 1979, his ambition was to represent Kaduna State in the Senate. But, luck did not smile on him.During the presidential campaigns, he was the boisterous campaign manager for the NPN standard bearer, Alhaji Shehu Shagari. After the poll, President Shagari appointed Dikko as the Transport Minister. Besides, he emerged as a member of the Shagari kitchen cabinet and the powerful NPN caucus. Other members of the powerful political cult included the late NPN National Chairman, the late Chief Adisa Akinloye, former Senate President Joseph Wayas, Senator Uba Ahmed and Senator Olusola Saraki.

    As the transport minister, Dikko acted as the defacto Vice President. The Minister of Agriculture complained that he was hijacking his responsibilities. But, the mandate of that ministry was actually transferred to him when Shagari appointed him as the Chairman of the Presidential Task Force on Rice Importation, following the collapse of the Green Revolution and eruption of food crisis in the early eighties.

    In 1982, Dikko grew wings. The power baron issued a warning to potential NPN presidential aspirants, saying that rivalry was prohibited.He said that there was no vacancy in in the State House, Ribadu Road, Lagos. He also told the late multi-millionaire businessman, Chief Moshood Abiola, who was warming up for the race that the presidency was not for sale to the highest bidder. In fact, the doors of the NPN secretariat was shut to prevent Abiola from obtaining the nomination form.

    During the electioneering campaigns, Dikko, declared that Shagari, who won by landslide in 1979, will win by moonslide in 1983. The opposition alleged that the poll was massively rigged.

    Shagari’s second term was short-lived. It was cut short by the military coup of December 31, 1983. The military interlopers made some allegations against the administration.  They included corruption, ineptitude and mismanagement of the economy.

    Dikko, like many key functionaries of the fallen regime,managed to escape abroad, following the army putsch. But, he was on the wanted list of the Buhari/Idiagbon regime, wich had hounded many of his colleagues into detention. In fact, the military government was desperate to extradict him. When that option failed, a plot was hatched to put him in a crate in London. But, the plot was foiled in London by vigilant security agents at the airport.

    For many years, Dikko was in exile. When he returned queitely, he became a spectator from the sideline. Gone were his ebbulience, fork tongue, power and influence. However, he tried to bounce back when the maximum military ruler, the late Gen. Sani Abacha, nominated him as a delegate to the ill-fated 1994 National Conference.

    Dikko was a PDP elder. But, unlike in the Second Republic, he could not exert his peculiar influence. He will be remembered for his Second Republic pomposity and arrogance of power.

     

  • Second Republic minister Umaru Dikko dies at 78

    Second Republic minister Umaru Dikko dies at 78

    Second Republic Minister of Transport Umaru Dikko died yesterday in London. He was 78.

    The influential minister in President Shehu Shagari’s cabinet between 1979-1983, escaped to London after the government was dethroned by the military on December 31, 1983.

    An attempt to ship him back home in a crate to answer corruption charges failed.

    His younger brother, Alhaji Lamido Dikko, confirmed his death.

    He survived an attempt by the military government to abduct and bring him back to Nigeria to face trial for corruption. British police intercepted the crate inside which he was placed at the airport.

    One of the early callers at his Kaduna residence was former Head of State and Umaru Dikko’s classmate at Barewa College, Gen. Yakubu Gowon, who described the late Dikko as a ‘good man’.

    He said Dikko was an efficient minister. He described his death as a great loss to the country, “no matter what anyone will say.”

    “I have known him since our school days in 1950. He was part of the Zaria Boys Association. I was the Chairman and he was my deputy. So you can see how long we have known each other and we have interrelated ever since.

    “And I can assure, he had been a very good person. He was a very effective minister, it was not his character to be what newspapers made him to be and I am sorry for what happened to him when he was to be forcibly returned to Nigeria from London, but thank God that that it was foiled.

    “His death is a great loss to the country no matter what anyone will say, he has been a good man from the beginning.”

    Second republic governor of Old Kaduna state, Alhaji Abdulkadir Balarabe Musa expressed sadness over the death of Dikko. He described him as a patriotic citizen and an elder statesman.

    Musa said, “Umaru Dikko was a patriotic Nigerian and a member of the Kaduna Mafia which collaborated with its Southern Counterpart to keep the Federal Government accountable to Nigerians in the 70s, he will certainly be missed”.

    Spokesman of the northern delegates to the National Conference, Anthony Sani, said they received with heavy heart the news about the death of Alhaji Umaru Dikko who was one of the moving forces of the ruling party ib the second republic.

    Dikko who was a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) appointed Chairman of the PDP disciplinary committee by the Bamanga Tukur-led Executive.

    Family sources said yesterday that since 2013, the late Dikko was in and out of hospital, saying: “he has been flown to London on several occasion since last year”.

     

  • What is Dikko Disciplinary Committee up to?

    What is Dikko Disciplinary Committee up to?

    The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has set up a disciplinary committee headed by Second Republic Transport Minister Dr. Umaru Dikko. But many stakeholders believe that what the party needs is reconciliation and not sanctions. Assistant Editor GBADE OGUNWALE reports.

    Ailing 77-year-old Dr Umaru Dikko, the chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) National Disciplinary Committee. His job is to investigate the allegations of indiscipline against party members and recommend the appropriate sanctions. The seven-member committee, which was inaugurated last week, is coming at a time the ruling party is desperate for peace and reconciliation with aggrieved and alienated members across the country. To make its job easier, the leadership of the PDP had exempted the seven “rebellious” governors, otherwise known as the G-7, from the committee’s brief.

    Also, leaders and members of the Abubakar Baraje faction, otherwise known as the New PDP, have also been excused from the committee. Their case is still pending before the Peace and Reconciliation Committee led by former President Olusegun Obasanjo. A peace meeting between the breakaway group and the camp of President Goodluck Jonathan, which was scheduled for October 7, was put on hold. No new date has been fixed for the meeting. With these exceptions, the scope of the Dikko Committee appears narrowed down to a handful of cases across the various geo-political zones.

    The states where the committee may have a job to do are Kwara, Ogun, Osun, Oyo, Ekiti, Rivers, Kano, Adamawa, Bayelsa and Lagos. Only a few days ago, a faction in the Kwara State chapter had approached the national leadership for sanctions against members of the New PDP. Former Kwara State Governor Bukola Saraki, his successor, Abdulfatah Ahmed and former Acting National Chairman, Alhaji Abubakar Baraje, are some of the leaders of the new PDP. A group led by the chairman of the Federal Character Commission, Professor Abdulraheem Oba, stormed the Abuja national secretariat, demanding for decisive action against Saraki and his loyalists. Specifically, the group sought to take over the party machinery from Saraki and his followers, describing them as “renegade members”. The PDP national chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, to wield the big stick, the group said that Saraki and his group have lost relevance. A chieftain Alhaji Salman Alada, said certain individuals who believe that nothing happens in Kwara politics without them will be brought to shame.

    “There cannot be two masters in the ship of PDP. The era of indiscipline is gone. Kwara State PDP will remain with the mainstream PDP. We apoligise for whatever might have happened. The new PDP is not known to any law. We want you to put on ground a strong disciplinary action to restore sanity because, if left undone, a lot of damage would be done by these renegades. We urge you to take steps to restore sanity in Kwara. The new PDP, as far as we can recognise in Kwara, is a party that has been constituted by proclamation and it is unknown to any democratic ideas or principles. If the people promoting that party are doing so on the excuse that they are trying to entrench democracy within the parent party, that is the wrong way to go. We on this delegation urge you, Mr. Chairman, that the time is now; not tomorrow. You must put on ground your strong foot of discipline to restore sanity in Kwara PDP”. Apparently referring to Saraki, Alada added: “People don’t know the true state of affairs in Kwara. Once they see one person, they think it’s Kwara. With the backing of the leadership of the party, Kwara must remain in the mainstream of the PDP”. Professor Oba also implored the National Working Committee (NWC) to ensure that any party chieftain in Kwara State, who identified with the Baraje faction, is brought to book. According to the him the PDP under Tukur’s leadership should not condone acts of indiscipline typified by the actions of Saraki, Baraje, Governor Ahmed and others who walked out on the party to join the breakaway faction. Tukur was however, tactical in his response to the group’s demands. He enjoined the delegation to align with the national leadership in the search for peace and reconciliation. According to the chairman, the leadership of the party would continue to push for total reconciliation with estranged members. Tukur insisted that the party would always be guided by the principle of consensus building.

    He said: “We believe in reconciliation without confrontation; restoring the party’s dignity without revenge, and also to build the party based on equity and justice”. Also in the delegation were Presidential Adviser on Ethics Mrs. Sarah Jubril; Senator, Suleiman Ajadi; former Transport Minister, Isa Bio; Mr. John Dara; Bode Ojomu. But, if the party is to be guided by the principle of reconciliation and consensus building, as enunciated by the chairman, then, what role is expected of the Dikko committee? Again, there is s subsisting national reconciliation committee chaired by the Bayelsa State Governor, Henry Seriake Dickson. The Dickson committee was put in place by the leadership of the party, with the backing of President Goodluck Jonathan.

    The committee had met with the factions in many states, to address their grievances. But, while the Dickson committee has been summoning stakeholders for reconciliatory meetings, the leadership of the party appears to be taking steps that tend to aggravate the existing cleavages. For instance, while the peace committee was still working, the NWC, on September 16, dissolved the executive committee of the Kano State chapter. A caretaker committee was constituted to replace the dissolved executive. The dissolution came shortly after the party received Mohammed, son of the late maximum ruler, General Sani Abacha, back into the PDP. Alhaji Alhassan Kafayos was named as the chairman of the caretaker committee, while Mr. Andrew Musa was appointed secretary.

    They were immediately sworn-in by the National Legal Adviser, Mr. Victor Kwom. The National Organising Secretary Abubakar Mustapha, said other members of the committee would be appointed in Kano during the week. But the other members that were co-opted into the caretaker committee had been on war the path with Governor Rabiu Kwankwaso. Speaking at the inauguration, Tukur said the tenure of the dissolved exco had expired on August 15. According to him, the party observed the rules and provision of its constitution in setting up the caretaker committee. Tukur charged the committee members to ensure that they listen to the grievances of aggrieved members, with a view to addressing them. He told them that winning the Kano governorship election in 2015 is a task that must be accomplished.

    The committee was set up without any input from the Kano governor, lending credence to insinuations that the committee was a ploy to sideline Governor Kwankwaso in the running of the chapter. Speaking with journalists a few days after the committee was inaugurated, MohammedAbacha said he joined the PDP in 2010 and left the party for the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC). He again left the CPC in 2010, owing to what he described as the lack of internal democracy in the CPC. Abacha added that he had held consultations with various PDP stakeholders, except the governor, who he promised to consult later. But the Baraje faction has never hidden it’s disdain for the peace efforts. According to the faction, Tukur is the obstacle to reconciliation.

    The National Publicity Secretary of the faction, Chief Chukwuemeka Eze, accused Tukur of creating crises in the various chapters and making half- hearted moves at reconciliation. Eze said Tukur had frustrated all efforts being made by President Goodluck Jonathan and other leaders to end crises in the party.

    Eze said: “The latest of the belligerent actions by the Tukur faction is the ill-advised move to take over the structures in the states controlled by the governors loyal to Baraje’s leadership. Mr. President should not be deceived by some party leaders, who are making him believe that he can do without us.

    “Most of these leaders cannot, under a properly organised free and fair elections, win their wards. It is obvious that no presidential election in Nigeria can be won without states like Rivers, Kano, Sokoto, Adamawa, Kwara, Niger and Kebbi states, which are under our control. Check the past general elections and you will see that some of these media-created PDP leaders have no followers in their states at the moment, talk less of making any impact come 2015″.

    The faction however, commended Jonathan and other party leaders for seeking amicable resolution of the crises and appealed to them not to relent in their determination to achieve results. According to Eze, what the PDP needs is not a disciplinary committee. Rather, the party, he said, is in dire need of internal democracy. He insisted that all the cases of disagreement and alleged anti-party activities by members were borne out of frustrations arising from the culture of impunity by the PDP under Tukur’s watch.

    Eze added: “We are asking that internal democracy be allowed to thrive within the party and that Tukur and his undemocratic gang should not see the party as their personal property in which they can wake up any day and fire whoever they dreamt about in their sleep. We will no longer condone such undemocratic reasoning and acts. We are adamant on achieving our aim of restoring democratic normalcy within the PDP as envisaged by the founding fathers of the party. This is a battle to which we have committed ourselves and there is no going back, until undemocratic elements within our party are flushed out as their acts have done much harm and brought much shame to our great party”.

    There is not much for the Dikko committee to do. In his acceptance speech after inauguration, the frail-looking Dikko was hardly audible. His movement from the ground floor to the second floor, the venue of the ceremony, was a labourous one. He was aided to his seat and it took some efforts before he could lower his frail frame into the seat. Going by the precarious situation in the PDP today, the Dikko Committee may as well be a window dressing. Analysts are of the opinion that, with the fragile state of party, any attempt by its leadership to hand down sanctions to aggrieved members may deepen the discontent in the ruling party.