2023: Aliyu cautions against instability in PDP

Former governor of Niger State, Babangida Aliyu, has cautioned leaders of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to guard against anything that will destabilise the party, ahead of the 2023 general elections.

Aliyu said more than any other time, the PDP needs to be united now and avoid anything that would portray the opposition party in a negative light before the electorate or trigger a crisis in its fold.

The former governor stated this in an interview, with journalists, in Abuja, at the weekend, against the backdrop of alleged plans by an interest group within the opposition party to force out members of the National Working Committee (NWC) before the expiration of their tenure in December 2021. Aliyu warned that any attempt to force the NWC out of office before the expiration of their tenure would create a crisis of confidence for the opposition party.

His words: “You don’t go abusing the whole party, like they say, throwing the baby with the bathwater because by the time you are thinking you are only dealing with the NWC, you are actually dealing with PDP as a party.

“Getting rid of them or getting rid of anybody in NWC now is creating the lack of confidence in the minds of the people.

“If people cannot even organise themselves as a party, how do you now entrust them with the governance of the country?”

Aliyu added: “If you want somebody to leave a position, there are ways to do it; you don’t go about the marketplace, calling somebody bad names just because you want him to leave.

“We have a way that we make people resign; we have a way that we query people if they have done wrong and we are elders enough that if things are that bad, we will find a way to advise people on what to do.

“But when you know that the people who are maybe planning to say the NWC should go, what is their objective; what is their aim? In the process of thinking you are correcting something, sometimes you destabilise it, and after all our convention comes up in December, how many months to come? So what would you want to do now that you cannot do in December" if you feel that bad?”