Automatic Ticket For Senators: Tension In PDP As Governors Tackle Party, Jonathan

Posted by African Examiner Featured, Latest Headlines, Politics Sunday, November 9th, 2014

Ayodele Afolabi, Abuja

The last may not have been heard about automatic tickets for Senators of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, as Governors who are affected by President Goodluck Jonathan gesture are reportedly spoiling for war.

The Senate plenary session was shut down twice last week to protest their denial of automatic tickets.

The aggrieved senators had also threatened to give solidarity to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal who recently dumped the PDP that gave him the ticket for the All Progressives Congress, APC.

The senators also said that they would not consider the MTEF (Medium Term Expenditure Framework) and there will be no 2015 budget.

They claimed that President Goodluck Jonathan has lost the senate because he has left the PDP structures in the hands of the governors warning that the governors should also do their job.

It was against this backdrop that Jonathan allegedly conceded 40 slots to the senators.

But sources in the ruling party said that this decision has already pitched the Governors against the President and the party.

“They told the party Chairman that if the decision was not reversed, they are ready to spill the beans and play a spoiler role to Jonathan ambition.

“Two of the affected Governors, one from South east and the other from North central have threatened to dump PDP, if their case is not attended to favourably.

“They told the party leadership that the President must call the bluff of the senators because they have no electoral value to add to Jonathan chance of winning election”, said the source.

As a result of the latest threat posed by these Governors, the source said that there is tension in the PDP as to how to approach the volatile situation without losing people to the opposition.

Among the 40 Senators promised return tickets, Banabas Gemade, a former PDP chairman is one of them and this may have sealed the fate of Gabriel Suswan.

On the other hand Ike Ekweremadu ticket may have put paid to Sullivan Chime’s ambition, while that of Senator James Manager may have dimmed the hope of Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan.