WIthin the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, events of the last two weeks have indeed brought out the worst among its leading lights. Some of them who have shared ideals and political camps for decades are now at both ends of the political divide, which was created by the August 31, 2013 factionalisation of the party.

*Gov Aliyu heads nPDP committee on teachers, FG’s rift
*Demands immediate unsealing of secretariats …
ABUJA—WORRIED by the prolonged strike by members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, the Abubakar Kawu Baraje-led new Peoples Democratic Party, nPDP, has commenced a seven-day fasting and prayer starting from today.

DR. Jonathan Silas Zwingina represented Adamawa South Constituency in the Senate between 1999 and 2007 on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).  In this interview, he said that the face-off between the PDP National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur and the rebelling governors within the party, was borne out of the urge by Tukur to fight the culture of impunity practised by some state governors. He also said that President Goodluck Jonathan had no agreement with the North over 2015, adding that the North has never formed a common front in any election. Excerpts:

This is the story of how the National Chairman of People’s Democratic Party, PDP, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, who operates from the Wadata Plaza, Wuse Zone 5, carry out his activities daily, with a cursory look at his actions after the August 31 Special National Convention of the party where the former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, who hails from the state with him, stormed out alongside six governors and later formed a ‘New PDP’.

If all goes as planned at today’s meeting, President Goodluck Jonathan is expected to create a soft landing for the embattled National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, septuagenarian Bamanga Tukur, pursuant to working out a tidy strategy for his removal from office, Sunday Vanguard can authoritatively reveal.