By Anthonia Onwuka

A synopsis of how the PDP overheats the polity whenever it wants to elect a national chairman or presidential candidate:

* February1999:  Presidential primaries in Jos, Plateau State:  Olusegun Obasanjo’s victory as the presidential candidate shakes the party.

*Late 1999: Katakata over choice of Bernabas Gemade over Chief Sunday Awoniyi as PDP chairman – Gemade wins at national convention but the process was considered undue

*Crisis over amendment of party constitution to extend tenure of national executive committee of the party by one year.  Gemade makes a push to make the law retroactive so he can benefit from the tenure elongation and this leads to crisis

*Emmanuel Ibeshi and Gbenga Olawepo (publicity secretaries of the party) insist that Gemade should not benefit just as they push for reforms in the party.  This leads to serious crisis in PDP.

* 2001: Gemade announces the suspension of Chief Anthony Anenih but this immediately backfires as the former was to recant the following day.  He is shoved aside but makes a prophesy that the fate that would befall his successor would be worse than his own.  Gemade, reluctantly bows out

* Audu Ogbeh, long-forgotten Second Republic Minister of Communications is exhumed and made PDP chairman but this also creates its own ripples

* April 2002: Brouhaha over presidential ambition of Obasanjo for second term.  Crisis erupts in PDP as associates of Vice President Atiku Abubakar talks of a MANDELA OPTION which Obasanjo was expected to adopt.

Ogbulafor, Bello, Baraje and Nwodo

This creates bad blood between Obasanjo and Atiku but they both tried to manage the crisis and keep it under the table.  Even the public declaration of Obasanjo for second term at the International Conference Centre, ICC, saw a president not mentioning the name of his running mate at all as he assesses his administration and prepares for a possible second term.

Just before then, Atiku, too, had played footsy by not making himself available for the public declaration but had to be compelled to attend to allow peace reign.

* January 2003: Atiku eyeballs Obasanjo over presidential primaries. January 2003: State governors insist that Obasanjo would not be marketable for the 2003 elections; urges Atiku on; Atiku turns down the offer at the last minute.

* 2004: Signs of a divided PDP National Executive Committee, NEC – Obasanjo forces pitched against Atiku’s associates

* Late 2004: Audu Ogbeh hits Obasanjo in an open letter, complaining about Obasanjo’s seeming overbearing attitude and the shambles that the President’s action was turning PDP into.

Obasanjo responds and goes vulgar against his party chairman, insinuating that Ogbeh may have made so much money after being made chairman of PDP – mind you, between Obasanjo and Ogbeh, they flouted the PDP constitution which says a national officer of the party shall not accept an appointment in government at the same time: Ogbeh was made Presidential Adviser to Obasanjo on Agric.

* Early 2005: Peace brokered between Obasanjo and Ogbeh forces at the PDP NEC meeting.  That NEC meeting was thought never to hold but it did.  The temperature in the polity reached boiling point.  Obasanjo had planned to publicly disgrace his party chairman but forces loyal to the party chairman, too, had their own response agenda, the consequences of which nobody could predict.

* Shortly after, Obasanjo forces Ogbeh to resign ahead of the end of his tenure after he was cajoled to visit Aso Rock Presidential and a resignation extracted from him, personally by Obasanjo

* Ahmadu Ali of the ALI MUST GO is exhumed from private life and imposed as national chairman of PDP without an election in 2005

* PDP shocks the nation and the political world when it announces that members of the party would be re-registered as members – something akin to sacking all your workers and telling them to re-apply.

* Obasanjo introduces a new phenomenon of tenure elongation dubbed Third Term.  This creates a new crisis in PDP and forces take sides.

* Third Term fails by April 2006
* Atiku and his associates are then forced out of PDP even while a case was in court on the matter
* 2007: Party congresses and primaries in shambles – PDP selects its candidates

* Presidential primaries and Obasanbjo’s insistence on Umar Musa Yar’Adua creates fresh crisis in the party.

* Yar’Adua emerges as PDP presidential candidate but many limbs are broken and faces bruised by Obasanjo in the process.

* 2008: Pre-national convention tussle between former Governor Sam Egwu and former Senate President Anyim Pius Anyim tears the party apart – matter resolved and all aspirants for the post of national chairman file behind Vincent Ogbulafor.

* Ogbulafor is forced out as national chairman when he insists on zoning, suggesting that Goodluck Jonathan is not suppose to contest – a 2001 fraud case is exhumed

*Okwesilieze Nwodo, founding national secretary of the party is re-integrated again as national chairman
* Nwodo mismanages a court process and is forced to resign as national chairmen.

*Haliru Mohammed, deputy national chairman takes over and becomes acting chairman

* Mohammed is appointed minister of defence and Baraje takes over as acting national chairman.

*March 24, 2012, PDP holds national convention from where a new national chairman emerges amid rancour of consensus candidacy about Bamanga Tukur.

PDP’S CONVENTIONS AT A GLANCE

•First meeting of PDP leaders and launching of the party was on August 19, 1998 to launch the party
•Second meeting was the Jos Convention in February 1999 to elect a Presidential candidate
•Third gathering of the PDP faithful was to elect Barnabas Gemade as Chairman

•The Fourth gathering was in 2003 where Obasanjo got the presidential tickect of the party, after a face-off with Atiku
•The fifth meeting was November, 2004 where Audu Ogbeh emerged national chairman

•The sixth gathering was in December 2005 where, through affirmation, Ahmadu Ali emerged Chairman of the party
•The seventh gathering was November 2006 where the amendment to the qualification for chairmanship of the Board of Trustees was carried

•The eight gathering was the election of Umar Musa Yar’;Adua as presidential candidate of the party
•The ninth gathering was the election of Vincent Ogbulafor as national chairman of the party

•April 2009 convention was the tenth gathering of the PDP faithful and it was for an amendment to the party’s constitution

•January 2011, Presidential primary of the party which produced Goodluck Jonathan as presidential candidate
•March 24, 2012, a new PDP Chairman emerges in the person of …..