By Johnbosco Agbakwuru

ABUJA — AS the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, continues to battle with the crisis that has depleted its membership, one of the founding members of the party, Professor Alphonsus Nwosu, has said that impunity in the party started in 1998.

Prof. Nwosu who was Minister of Health under President Olusegun Obasanjo, was said to have contested and won the PDP governorship primaries in Anambra State in 1998 but was removed by the appeal panel.

Speaking exclusively to Vanguard in Abuja, Prof. ABC Nwosu, who was also a special Adviser to President Obasanjo on political matters before becoming a minister, expressed optimism that the PDP will bounce back if it can play by the rules.

Commenting on the crisis in the opposition party, he said: “What is happening in the party started even early in 1998 with my winning of the governorship ticket in Anambra and it was removed by the appeal panel.

“When the party started deviating from its founding principles, then the problem started and it started with; you remember that the first set of governorship candidates that is us. We ran the primaries and campaigned in all the local governments but our tickets were taken away from us.

“Some of us went on appeal. So, if you take the case of Anambra State, you would see the warning given by the men who ran the election. Gen. A.B. Mamman, with Sen. Dagash and Dr. Debu Igwe.They said, If the party was going to go that way, it would be a pity.

“But it has gone that way. It has followed impunity, rather than the rules as set by the party. And so, that is what has happened to the party and continues to happen to the party.”

He also accused former President Goodluck Jonathan of contributing to the problem in the PDP, by insisting that he was going to contest for second tenure when he was aware of the rotational principal.

He said: “And again, that the party shall run on a rotational basis, North and South for presidency. Then, Umaru Yar’adua died, a Northerner did not complete his tenure, the Vice President (Goodluck Jonathan), completed the tenure.

“But that Vice President insisted on having a tenure of his own and they bent over to give him tenure but he wanted to do two tenures, and then that was when the open rebellion took place in PDP.

“At the end of it, the President was dropped (he lost election), and the APC (All Progressives Congress) came up. If PDP had brought a Northern candidate, according to its rules, it would not have lost the election.”

Prof. Nwosu, who has since resigned from active politics, further said that the influence of money bags especially the governors in funding the party contrary to the original idea by the founding fathers where it will be funded by members also contributed to the crisis the party is having.

He said, “again, PDP said that the party would be funded by members through membership etc. At that time, PDP members were up to six million people, and assuming that you paid N1,000 or N2,000 you were going to get 12 billion naira.

“So, governors and money bags took over, especially governors. So political parties became forum for governors forum within that party. So these were what were debated.

” So I think that what has happened to PDP was that it started going not by the rules it sets for itself, but by the face of man, the legitimizers the supermen, they became legitimizers. “

Stressing that he who pays the piper dictates the tune, he said the only way the party could bounce back is by putting the rules right, respect the rotational principle and restore the confidence Nigerians had in it.

“PDP, if it wants to come back, must put the rules right, rotation right, funding must be got right. And then it knows that it was to have the faith of the people,” he said.

He, however expressed optimism that the party will recover from the crisis.

He said, “well, I’m very happy for the present crisis because I have faith that it will recover. Why do I say so? Because it’s good that APC has shown us what the alternative is.

“I was once a political adviser to the president before becoming minister, and I recall that the president (Bola Tinubu) took President (Olusegun) Obasanjo to court over non democratic tendencies. Nigerians can judge now how far we have gone along the road.

“So if PDP didn’t give way, we would not have known that it could ever become like this. We would never know that a democratic government could also suspend a democratic government.

“We are quite clear that what we are running now is not a federal government, and that’s why you are seeing people saying, let us return to true federalism, let us go back to fiscal federalism.”