20 People’s Democratic Party (PDP) governorship aspirants from the North-West zone have protested what they described as an attempt by the outgoing governors of the party in four states in the zone to impose unpopular persons on the electorate as candidates of the party, saying such moves would not augur well for the party in the forthcoming elections.
The aggrieved aspirants in Kaduna accused the incumbent governors of hijacking the party’s recent congress and last Saturday’s screening exercise in order to impose their anointed candidates specifically in Jigawa, Katsina, Kaduna and Kebbi states.
A former Senator from Katsina state, Ibrahim Idah, who addressed the press on behalf of 19 other aspirants, which include the former deputy governor of Kebbi state, Ibrahim Aliyu, former Minister of Aviation, Hassan Hyat, from Kaduna State and Abba Anas Adamu, from Jigawa state, said they viewed the move by the governors as a calculated attempt to frustrate and deliberately compromise the success of the forthcoming 2015 general election.
While insisting that candidates of the party must emerge through a transparent primary, they however called on the national leadership of the party to urgently wade into the matter by providing a level playing ground for all aspirants in order not to give an unfortunate but avoidable advantage to the opposition.
