Atiku replies Jonathan; I am ‘protecting the PDP’

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar on Monday replied the
presidency on his involvement in the formation of a splinter
Peoples Democratic Party.
President Goodluck Jonathan’s Special Adviser on Political
Matters, Ahmed Gulak, had said on Monday that Mr. Abubakar
should be grateful for being allowed to return to the party.
“I was surprised because Atiku is supposed to know more than
another person that there is no party like PDP. He left PDP and
went to ACN and he came back to PDP, because he discovered that
outside PDP there is no party, so he had to come back and he was
even given the waiver to contest the primaries election in 2011,”
Mr. Gulak said.
“Atiku should be grateful to PDP. Atiku is indebted to PDP and the
best way to continue to pay the debt is to protect PDP,” he added.
In his response, sent by his media aide, Garba Shehu, Mr.
Abubakar said he does not dispute the fact that he is indebted to
the PDP; but that the best way to continue to pay that debt is to
protect PDP.
“That is exactly what I am doing: Protecting the PDP,” the former
vice president said.
Mr. Abubakar led seven serving PDP governors and other party
leaders to stage a walkout of the party’s national convention on
Saturday.
The group later announced the formation of a separate faction of
the party to be led by a former PDP Acting Chairman, Abubakar
Baraje.
A former PDP National Secretary and former Osun State Governor,
Olagunsoye Oyinlola, is the National Secretary of the new faction.
The faction on Monday filed a case before a Lagos High Court
asking the court to order the exit of the PDP National Chairman,
Bamanga Tukur, and other members of the party’s National
Working Committee.