Mu’azu Meets Obasanjo Over Ogun PDP Crisis

The new National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu, met behind closed doors on Sunday with former President Olusegun Obasanjo in Abeokuta, Ogun State.
Mu’azu arrived at Obasanjo’s Hilltop Mansion at about 3.30pm in a convoy of four vehicles.
He was in company with a former PDP National Secretary, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola; ex- governor of Ekiti State, Mr. Segun Oni; Senator Andy Uba; a former Chairman of the PDP in Ogun State, Senator Dipo Odujinrin; and an ex-National Auditor, Chief Bode Mustapha.
It was leant that after welcoming the team, Obasanjo and Mu’azu went into an inner reception where they discussed for about 40 minutes.
Mu’azu and his team left Abeokuta at about 5.35pm, declining to speak with journalists who had besieged the gate to the former President’s mansion.
A PDP chieftain, who was in Obasanjo’s house during the visit, said, “Baba (Obasanjo) alone went into the meeting with Mu’azu .”
A member of the PDP National Working Committee later told The PUNCH that the letter the former President wrote to the immediate past PDP Chairman, Dr. Bamanga Tukur, dominated the discussion.
He said, “Baba explained his grievances with the party, particularly how a PDP chief in Ogun State, Chief Buruji Kasamu, had been given a central role in the South-West PDP. The chairman promised to look into Obasanjo’s complaints.”
Mua’zu was also said to have enjoined Obasanjo to support President Goodluck Jonathan in 2015.
Odujirin, in a telephone interview with one of our correspondents, said, “It is a good move for the chairman to have visited Baba. When he came, I told him I was the chairman (of Ogun State PDP) that was removed by his predecessor and he said, ‘We will look into that.”’
Also, a former member of the House of Representatives, Mr. Kayode Amusan, said that Muazu’s visit had to do with the crisis rocking the state’s chapter of the party.
Amusan described Obasanjo as a factor to reckon with in the country’s politics, adding that it would be difficult for any official of the party not to recognise his influence.
“Baba has ruled this nation for many years. So, you can’t rule him out in this country. Of course in a democratic dispensation, there must be regrouping, there must be alignment and there must be realignment,” he added.
Obasanjo, had in a letter to Tukur dated January 7, 2014, accused the PDP of negating the principles of morality, decency and discipline in its decisions, especially as they affected the South-West.
Part of the letter reads, “While I believe that a good and truly national political party must be a microcosm of the nation in its membership, made up of all sorts of characters from near-saints to near-satan.
“Kashamu Buruji has been so extolled in PDP in South-West geo-political zone, which I personally find unsavoury. Politics played by any national political party must have morality, decency, discipline, principles and leadership examples as cardinal practices of the party. I have attached here recent documents that clearly indicate that your extolled PDP Zonal Leader in the South-West zone of Nigeria and an indigene of Ogun State is, to say the least, not a credit to the party as a member, let alone being a zonal leader.”
But Tukur, in his response, told Obasanjo that Kashamu enjoyed the party’s support because of the role he (Kashamu) played in strengthening the PDP in the South-West.
Kasamu also faulted Obasanjo,saying the January 7 letter was a ‘cocktail of lies.’
The Odujirin-led PDP executive in Ogun State was dissolved by Tukur in early 2013 when Oyinlola and Mustapha, were relieved of their positions.
Meanwhile, the PDP has dismissed reports that Mu’azu was under investigation by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
The PDP, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, said that Mu’azu was only invited once by the anti-graft agency after he left office as governor of Bauchi State.
It said, “Our attention has been drawn to mischievous and misleading publications in some sections of the media purporting that our National Chairman is under investigation by the EFCC for alleged misappropriation and embezzlement of state funds during his tenure as the governor of Bauchi State.
“The said publications are completely false and baseless and part of the vicious scheme by the opponents of our party to distract our national chairman from his determination and commitment to rebuild and reposition the PDP as the pre-eminent party in Nigeria.”