PROF. JERRY GANA - TO DO OR NOT TO DO? President Goodluck Jonathan has banned the Professor Jerry Gana-led Special National Convention Committee from selling of nomination forms to aspirants into the National Working Committee (NWC) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Sunday Independent can authoritatively confirm that the president took the decision following protest by the PDP National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur who accused the Gana-led panel of usurping his functions. Tukur had protested to the presidency that it was not in the schedule of duties of the Gana-led Convention Committee to sell nomination forms to aspirants in the coming election but the interim National Working Committee (NWC) of the party headed by him. It would be recalled that Gana had announced last week that interested members of the party seeking election as officers of the PDP should purchase nomination forms from his committee. This move by Gana, Sunday Independent gathered, was to throw spanner in the works of the presidency and Tukur who were reported to have mapped out plans to sell nomination forms to only those they wanted to bring on board as members of the reconstituted NWC of the party. At the reconciliation meeting convened by the president during the week, it also emerged that amidst the confusion on the date the Special National Convention is supposed to hold, President Jonathan has also waded into the imbroglio and backed the August 31 date earlier announced by the Gana committee. In attempting to resolve the issue, the president urged the feuding parties to make some concessions. For instance, as a compensation for Gana who was asked to back-down on sale of nomination forms, Sunday Independent findings revealed that the president attempted to please him by endorsing his August 31 date for the mini Convention. Tukur has been in a running battle with the Gana-led Convention Committee over the August 31 date. The PDP boss had asked the committee headed by Gana, to suspend all actions on the convention. The date announced by Gana’s committee for the convention was August 31, but Tukur was not pleased with it, asking that the committee should halt plans for the convention until all contending issues have been regularised. But the president over-ruled Tukur and asked the Gana-committee to proceed with the August 31 date. Sources also said the president sought closer working relationship between Tukur-led NWC and the Gana-led convention panel. The president asked the gladiators to sheathe their sword and work harmoniously for the success of the convention where new NWC members would emerge. But despite the presidential intervention for peace between the Tukur-led NWC and the convention committee, sources told our correspondent that the crisis trailing the convention was far from over because it was believed that the presidency has effectively hijacked the party’s machinery through Tukur and that Gana’s committee would only rubber stamp the process. Even the directive by the president that the convention date of August 31 as announced by the Gana’s committee should remain sacrosanct, sources said it was a case of collecting gold from Gana and exchanging it with sawdust as according to the source, if the president meant well, he would have allowed Gana’s committee to proceed with the sell of nomination forms to interested aspirants seeking election into the party’s NWC. Meanwhile, there has not been a change of date for the South-West Congress scheduled to hold on August 24. ginainternationalnewsagency/pdp-convention-jonathan-stops-gana-panel-from-selling-forms/
Posted on: Sun, 21 Jul 2013 09:06:09 +0000
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