Bayelsa PDP youths oppose APC returnees’ bid for gov ticket

Tue, Jul 9, 2019 | By publisher


Politics

AHEAD of the Bayelsa State governorship election, the Peoples Democratic Party Youth Network has said it will resist any attempt to give the party’s ticket to defectors, who recently returned to the PDP from the All Progressives Congress.

The PDPYN Secretary General, James Oputin, in a statement on Sunday, warned that any move by the PDP leadership to hand over the party to politicians and aspirants who turned their back on the party during critical moments would spell doom for the party.

Oputin called on the PDP national leadership to tread with caution on the sensitive issue of electing a candidate for the governorship poll in the state in order not to endanger its chances of retaining political power.

According to him, members of the PDPYN spread across Bayelsa State are alarmed to see staunch critics of the PDP since 2012 returning to the party and positioning themselves to get the party’s ticket.

He said giving the party’s ticket to such persons would be tantamount to social injustice against dedicated members who had, through their sacrifices, nurtured the party in the last 11 years.

“The PDPYN will mobilise its members in all the nooks and crannies of Bayelsa to resist any attempt to yield the party to those whose previous actions have shown clearly that they don’t care about it,” Oputin said.

He called on the National Chairman of the PDP, Prince Uche Secondus, to be wary of noxious external influence and the APC returnees and their divisive antics as the party moved to pick its governorship candidate for the next election.

He said it would be regrettable for the national leadership of the PDP to think that the party would win the Bayelsa State governorship election without the support of Governor Seriake Dickson and the Restoration Team.

He called on Dickson, “to stand up in defence of what is right before it is too late.”

Oputin said, “The leadership of the PDPYN has viewed with concern the surreptitious move by some forces to hand over our party to the APC returnees who we defeated in 2015.

“We are calling the attention of the national leadership to the ungodly alliance of those who have been fighting the Restoration Team since 2012 and those who abandoned the party for the APC in 2015.

“We have built this party for the past seven years; we have nurtured and nourished it to the heavily formidable, cohesive and preferred platform that it has become over the past seven years in Bayelsa.

“These people cannot point to one sacrifice they have made for the PDP in the past seven years but they are peddling the false narrative that the PDP can win election without the Restoration Team. Where were they when we fought the most recent battle in the last general elections?

“We are constrained to say that the PDPYN shall resist this attempt to pay evil for good. We and our leaders have worked to build the PDP to its present state and we will not fold our hands to watch unstable politicians take it over.

“The national leadership of the PDP would do well to ensure that the Bayelsa PDP goes into this crucial electoral battle as one solid, united and cohesive platform. The PDP does not need this costly gamble at this time.” – Punch

– July 9, 2019 @ 10:22 GMT |

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