The Acting National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Amb. Umar Damagum, has dismissed suggestions that he was mobilizing state chairmen of the party to perpetuate himself in office.
He said this in his remarks before going into a closed door meeting with the chairmen of the party from the 36 states of the federation including Abuja, yesterday.
Damagum who has been in the eye of a storm over a leadership power tussle involving the position of National Chairman, refuted claims of any wrong doing.
He said, “My chairmen, who are my commanders in the States, this is not an unusual meeting. We’ve had this kind of meetings before.
“ This is not the first time, for the record, I want to make it very clear that this meeting was to interact with the state chairmen.
“You can see from the introduction, more than half of the state chairmen here are brand new, for us to know ourselves and also discuss other matters such as the coming Zonal Congresses.
“It has nothing to do, like has been insinuated in the social media about NEC or something of that nature. You can read it.
READ ALSO: PDP Crisis: Tension rises ahead of party’s NEC meeting
Breaking! PDP NWC in crucial meeting with State Chairmen
“I have not met any of you chairmen, from the time you were invited until in this hall, if I am right. So for the record, I want to set the record straight. There is no such issue.
“Issues of the National Executive Council (NEC) is entirely within the purview of NWC and the chairman.
“So we are not calling the chairmen here to maybe insinuate anything. So just for the record, it is a normal interactive session to welcome the new chairmen that have just joined us and also to know ourselves and to further discuss the ongoing Zonal Congresses.
“As you know there are already forms for the Zonal Congresses.”
Austin Nwachukwu, Imo State PDP Chairman and Interim Chairman, PDP Chairman’s Forum.
Collaborating this position, the Acting Chairman of the Fourm of PDP State Chairmen, Austin Nwachukwu told reporters after the meeting that the event was a familiarization gathering.
According to him, more than half of this in attendance were newly elected as State Chairmen as such the meeting was necessary to foster unity among them.
He said, “The NWC deemed it fit to gather all of us in Abuja to enable us know each other. It is essentially to familiarize ourselves with the NWC and those of them whose tenure are still running and will be running out next year.”