It’s no longer news, former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Ghali Na’Abba, has dumped the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP).
Ghali Umar Na’Abba
In an interview with Daily Trust, the former speaker reveals why he dumped PDP. Read excerpts from the interview below:
On his reasons for defecting: “The PDP was founded in 1998 by its founding fathers and millions of founding members trooped into the party enthusiastically, believing that a party has been formed that will grow democracy. But it is unfortunate that 16 years after, PDP has not grown democracy. It has refused to allow its members to grow within the party. What we are seeing today is a situation whereby impunity and corruption are taking over the party to the extent that there have been so much imposition of candidates to contest for various offices within the polity. This is one of the fundamental reasons I thought I must leave the party.
On his defections as a result of personal frustration: “Certainly, you cannot divorce one’s feelings about his party from his own personal interest and it will be false to pretend that some of the reasons why I am leaving the PDP are not also personal. But to be honest, my reasons are not totally personal, if it were for personal reasons I would have left long ago. Whatever it is I lost in the course of establishing democracy in this country is the price I have to pay for leadership.”
On what future does he see for PDP: “I really don’t see any future for the party because once a party loses its soul, the only method available to it to maintain its presence is through doing the kind of things the vice president is doing, by going to various states and meeting various stakeholders, giving them money and making promises of things that they will give after the elections. But nobody will be interested in doing anything for the party because people are tired of the PDP. The PDP is maintained through inertia and nothing more. I don’t see how the party can survive all of these things, in most states, the PDP is dead. Of course, there are structures but nobody is interested in it and feeling committed to it. So once a party exists and nobody is truly committed to it, then, the party is dead.”
On his future plans: “At the moment, as a politician, I have a lot of friends within other political parties who have been discussing with me and I may eventually end up in another party since I have not retired from politics. In the next few days I may be in another party and I may decide not to go to any party until after the elections, when I see the terrain more clearly.”
Meanwhile the Kano State of PDP has described the defection of the former speaker of the House of Representatives, Ghali Umar Na’Abba, from the party as a non-issue saying the politician “was of no value aside the relics of him serving an office”.
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