Following reactions trailing the supposed suspension of the embattled National Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Prince Uche Secondus, and his rejoinder, the Rivers State Chairman of the party, Ambassador Desmond Akawor, restating the party’s position has disclosed the reason for said suspension.
Akawor who spoke in a radio programme monitored by City News in Port Harcourt said the party identified the failure of Prince Uche Secondus to pay his party dues and his refusal to hug a decampee from the All Progressives Congress (APC) as some of the reasons behind his travails as National Chairman of the party.
He said: “As of today, he remains suspended. He was suspended at the ward level; of course ratified by the local government area and the state level. As of today, he is no longer our national chairman.
“We now have an acting chairman. He (Secondus) completely derailed from the tenets of the party,” Akawor said.
Asked why the state PDP does not want Secondus as the party’s national chairman, he said, “I will definitely mention one key point.”
“June 3rd, I wrote a letter to all wards that they should furnish us with names of party members that are dead, party members that have not paid their dues, and party members one way or the other that have decamped.
“Among the wards that responded was Ward 5 in Andoni, and it clearly shows that he (Secondus) has not paid his dues.
“In the Constitution of our party, it is an offence for six consecutive months, two quarters, if you have not paid your dues, your membership of the party is in question.
“That issue was kept pending because we had to approach the nation to represent some of these issues. Then, at that ward level, a lot of party members were completely balkanized and they were in different camps.
“Then, of course when these issues were presented to the elders and they started to intervene, the news from the nation now started coming to us and became embarrassing.”
Akawor also referenced a scenario that played out when the party received some high profile decampees from the APC in the state.
“He refused to embrace Davies Ikanya (pioneer APC State Chairman) when he defected from APC to PDP,” he added.
Citynewsph
