PDP Officials To Ribadu-provide More Evidences To Earn Waiver

The governorship dreams of a former
chairman of the Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission (EFCC), Nuhu Ribadu,
appears to have hit a bump as the Peoples
Democratic Party is demanding more information
from him before deciding whether to grant him
and two other aspirants waivers to take part in
primaries scheduled for September 6 to pick the
party’s candidate for the Adamawa State
governorship election.

After two contentious meetings over the last two
days, national officials the PDP were unable to
decide whether to grant waivers to Mr. Ribadu,
Brigadier General Buba Marwa (ret.), and Marcus
Gundiri to participate in the primary process. All
three governorship aspirants had requested the
waivers to enable them to vie in the primaries
after they recently defected from the All
Progressives Congress (APC) to the PDP.
But after two marathon meetings that took place
at the national headquarters of the party in
Abuja and the Presidential Villa, the members of
the National Working Committee of the party
were unable to agree on whether or not to grant
the waivers.
Owing to the serious disagreements among the
NWC members, the screening of the aspirants,
which scheduled to take place in Abuja on
Thursday, has been moved to Saturday, August
30.
The PDP’s NWC set up a subcommittee that
includes the party’s national legal adviser,
national publicity secretary and national financial
secretary to demand more documentation from
the PDP’s vice chairman for the northeast zone.
The subcommittee was mandated to request
more information from Mr. Ribadu and other
recent defectors to demonstrate that they truly
qualify for waivers.
A source from the NWC told SaharaReporters
that the party must proceed cautiously on the
issue of extending waivers to the defectors in
order not to leave longtime and loyal members
of the party disaffected.
Last week, Mr. Ribadu created a media splash
when he announced his resignation from APC
and defection to the PDP as well as his desire to
seek his new party's nomination as the
governorship candidate.
Meanwhile, the PDP has yet to release the
names of members of its screening panel for the
Adamawa governorship.
The party’s national organizing secretary,
Abubakar Mustapha, defended the party's
position, telling reporters in Abuja that the
screening would now take place on Saturday
while the names of the screening panel members
will be released on Friday.