Michael Jegede
Prof. Tunde Adeniran, an aspirant for the chairmanship position of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has identified imposition, impunity and lack of due process within the party as major factors responsible for its loss of power at the centre to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2015.
Adeniran, a former Minister of Education and one-time Nigerian Ambassador to Germany, who has obtained his form for the PDP’s chairmanship contest, made the observation in an interview on Thursday in Abuja.
The educationalist turned politician maintained that PDP as a party in government for sixteen years did excellently well to meet the yearnings and aspirations of the Nigerian people, noting that it only played into the hands of the APC with certain acts of omission and commission by those that managed its affairs in the past.
“Despite PDP’s excellent performance in the various sectors of the country’s economy for 16 years, the party failed in the last election because of certain things that we did wrongly. We were guilty of the problem of imposition, impunity, not following due process within the party. Some of us made as much noise as possible about it. But it seems that some people who were placed in charge of the party did not response positively. Things went wrong when they ought not to because we raised alarm and we drew attention to all these shortcomings and the violation of the spirit of the constitution of the party. The party became handicapped and could not survive the recklessness of some of the people who mismanage its affairs,” Adeniran remarked.
The former Minister, however, said all hope was not lost as he intends to restructure, rebrand, refocus and reposition the PDP for victory in 2019, if given the opportunity to become the national chairman, adding that his wealth of experience will be of great help to his leadership of the party.
According to him, “There is nothing that is required to run such a party that I do not have. Through the grace of God, I think I have solid background both in education and political experience. I have been involved in this game for decades, starting from my days as a student. I have been party to the formation of at least three major political parties in this country in different republics. And I have occupied certain positions of great responsibility. What is also important is that I understand thoroughly the internal workings of the system – governmental system and party system. And I have demonstrated it in the capacity that I have occupied working for the party or working for the government and the people. The capacity is there; the commitment is there and of course the factors that would make for success are within me with the grace of God.”
He further stated that he will run a people-oriented and all-inclusive party administration where the inputs of members at all levels would be taken into consideration in the decision-making process within the party.
