Jonathan, Nwodo meet over state of PDP in South West
President Goodluck Jonathan is worried that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is fast losing grip of the South West zone, which he believes might affect the party's outing in the 2011 general elections.
The President is said to have expressed his fears, during a meeting with the national chairman of the PDP, Okwesilieze Nwodo last weekend.
Three of the six states in the South West region are controlled by opposition parties while there are protracted crises in the others controlled by the PDP.
The six states in the zone are Oyo, Ogun, Osun Ondo, Ekiti and Lagos. While Oyo, Ogun and Osun are controlled by the PDP, Lagos and Ekiti are run by Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) administrations. The Labour Party controls the government in Ondo State.
According to a source at the national secretariat of the PDP, Mr Okwesilieze, who returned from his overseas trip last Friday, was said to have met with the President to discuss the state of affairs in the ruling party.
Mr Jonathan was said to have mandated the PDP chairman during the meeting to explore all avenues towards resolving the crises and unite the various factions in the party in the zone.
"Jonathan gave Nwodo the mandate to explore all avenues towards resolving the crises so as to avoid a situation where the main opposition party in the South West, the Action Congress of Nigeria could exploit the crack within the PDP state chapters to its advantage," the source said.
Both Messrs Jonathan and Nwodo were said to have discussed the crisis in Enugu State, especially the dissolution of the party's executive in the state.
The President, the source said, insisted that the matter should be left to the court to determine since some members of the party had challenged the dissolution in court.
It was learnt that the President, who is the leader of the party, was aware of the plan to dissolve the executive in Enugu, having held a meeting with Mr Nwodo and some members of the National Working Committee (NWC) before he (Nwodo) went on vacation abroad.
Our source indicated that Enugu State chapter was dissolved because it was among the chapters whose members did not challenge their 2008 congresses in court but merely quarrelled over the matter.
When contacted yesterday, Ike Abonyi, the media aide to Mr Nwodo said he was not aware that Mr Jonathan is worried over the state of PDP in the south west zone.
"I am not aware of the President's position on the matter you are talking about. All I can say is that the PDP chairman returned from abroad last Friday. I have not been briefed about his meeting with the President," Mr Abonyi said.
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