Olafeso, Agbaje May Emerge as Ayu’s Replacement

· Arapaja, Mimiko on the Card

 Following the insistence of Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike’s camp on the resignation of Dr Iyorchia Ayu as National Chairman of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) as a condition for his support, the party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) and the Board of Trustees (BOT) may be looking towards South-West to produce his replacement.

Sources privy to the conversation between Wike and the presidential candidate of the PDP, Atiku Abubakar, at the London meeting, said Wike’s group insisted that Ayu should step down as the National Chairman of the party, and be replaced by a former Governor of Ondo State, Dr Olusegun Mimiko.

Top on the list is the former National Vice Chairman, South-West, and governorship aspirant of the party in Ondo State, Dr Eddy Olafeso. The second person is a two-time governorship candidate of the PDP in Lagos State, Mr Jimi Agbaje.

An influential group in the party in the South-West is reportedly opposed to Mimiko as the Chairman, because of his alleged inconsistent membership and ‘nomadic disposition,’ having defected from PDP to Zenith Labour Party, worked against the party’s interest only to return a couple of years later.

“Though both of them are from Ondo State, we will rather prefer Dr Eddy Olafeso, a onetime Commissioner in Ondo State as the new National Chairman, but the Wike group are objecting to it, saying that Dr. Olafeso was a man Friday of the former National Chairman’s man, Prince Uche Secondus and by extension Atiku Abubakar’s man too,” the source said.

According to other sources, Olafeso’s contribution to the success of the party in the South-West in the 2019 elections which produced Governor Seyi Makinde, and several federal lawmakers in the zone, and the spirited fight in 2018 in Osun State that laid the foundation for the emergence of Governor-elect, Senator Ademola Adeleke recently.

Another source said that some loyalists of Wike proposed the appointment of Taofeek Arapaja as acting national chairman of PDP, but the names of Agbaje and Olafeso might be presented to Atiku in the next few weeks, while Olafeso could emerge as the next PDP national Chairman before October.

The PDP crisis escalated after Delta State governor, Ifeanyi Okowa, was unveiled as Atiku’s running mate on June 16, especially since consequent upon the emergence of Waziri Adamawa as the party’s presidential candidate at a period some leaders wanted the South to produce the president.

Atiku’s emergence in the race which produced Wike as runner-up, threw the spanner into the wheel of the party, with Wike threatening to leave and various moves to reconcile all parties have failed.

Atiku had last Thursday met with Wike in London alongside governors of Abia, Benue, Adamawa, and the Oyo States and other PDP stakeholders like Donald Duke.

Wike’s insistence on Ayu’s resignation, sources said, would balance the leadership of the party in which all the top national positions in the PDP are being held by members from the northern zones of the country.