Accord party threatens to break alliance with PDP

Irked that the Delta State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party has allegedly derailed from the Memorandum of Understanding it reached with the Accord party in the state, the sister party on Monday threatened to pull out.
Accord party has currently fielded no fewer than 14 chieftains of the PDP in the state, including the former Speaker of the state’s House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Victor Ochei, and a former House of Representatives member, Hon. Doris Uboh, for various elective positions in the state.
The party is worried that the state chairman of the PDP, Chief Edwin Uzor, engaged opposition parties, including the Accord party, in hate campaigns by urging voters to discountenance any purported alliance.
Accord party, which has since 2007 been a sister party to PDP in the state, has adopted Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, PDP’s governorship flag-bearer, and President Goodluck Jonathan, as their governorship and residential candidates.
Handling down the warning in Asaba on Monday, the state Chairman of the Accord party, Comrade David Ashikodi, cautioned the ruling party to stop denying the existing alliance.
Ashikodi wondered why the PDP suspended and expelled those covered by the alliance’s immunity clause.
“The PDP chairman’s utterance smacked-off arrogance. It is politically immature on his part to deny such existing alliance on the ground that politics was a game of inclusion and not exclusion,” Ashikodi said.
Ashikodi recalled how Senator Patrick Osakwe, Evangelist Onyemachi Mrakpor and Princess Pat Ajudua respectively won their House of Assembly seats in 2007 before returning to their original party.
The party said it will not hesitate to pull out of the alliance and open its doors of negotiation with other political parties for the governorship election if the PDP persisted in its present campaign.
Ashokodi said: “I am surprised that the PDP chairman could make such a statement. I want to warn that the PDP should not act arrogantly because politics is about inclusion and not exclusion. Instead of wooing other parties to your side, the PDP chairman is acting immaturely and denying the working alliance.
“Accord is a registered political party in Nigeria and if we decide to negotiate with another party, for instance, the Labour Party, the chances of the PDP governorship candidate will be very slim especially in Delta north which is our stronghold.
“Let me make it categorically clear that alliance or no alliance, Accord Party is capable of winning elections. We are a grassroots party and we are the major threat to PDP in Delta north where we have elections in the past.”