A former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, has blamed President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan for the crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Party.
Abubakar, in an opinion article made available to the media on Saturday, said Jonathan’s interests have been discovered to be central to the face-offs within the party.
He therefore faulted the decision of the President to set up a reconciliation committee to resolve the disputes within the party.
He said what the party needed at this time was an independent committee made up of “credible and neutral members” to resolve the crisis.
He wrote: “The President has no business setting up any committee on party matters when his interests are widely believed to be central to the ongoing acrimony within the party.
“It is therefore imperative that we establish an independent committee comprised of credible and neutral members to look into the crises of the Party dispassionately and offer a lasting solution because no one can impose their preferred solution on a Party as diverse as our own.
“All members must be treated fairly whether or not they belong to the President’s camp.
“Otherwise, we will force people to exercise other options available to them, which the Party may not like.”
Abubakar said it was disappointing to note that the reports of credible committees set up in the past to reconcile aggrieved members of the party had not been implemented only for another committee to be set up.
He specifically mentioned the committees chaired by a former Vice President, Dr. Alex Ekwueme, and a former Minister of External Affairs, retired General Ike Nwachukwu.
Abubakar said in the first instance, the Presidency has no business in the running of the affairs of the party.
He said once a president emerges on the platform of a party, he or she becomes the father of the nation and does not get involved in the politics of the party except at the policy level.
He said Jonathan’s involvement in the politics of the PDP is unhealthy and unhelpful.
He said: “I call on the executive arm to leave the Party alone and make a more productive use of its time to govern the country.
“It will be unhealthy and unhelpful for the government to insist on running the Party and the country at the same time.
“In mature democracies such as the United States, the President becomes a statesman and the leader of the whole country once his election victory is announced.
“He leaves party management to party apparatchiks and delves into partisan matters only at policy level.
“If this model has worked well for the United States, I cannot see why it should not work well for us.
“The presidential system has its own internal logic and protocol.
“We need to understand this logic and protocol if our system is to succeed.”
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