There is no end in sight to the controversy threatening to doom the PDP’s challenge for power in 2023 as the presidential candidate of the party Atiku Abubakar has favored the appointment of Governor Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto State as the Director General of the campaign council, Podium Reports exclusively gathered.
Sources told Podium Reporters today that Atiku, who remains at loggerheads with Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State over his choice of running mate, has grown frustrated with attempts to placate the Rivers Governor and has rejected his preferred candidate for the Campaign DG position, instead okaying the appointment of Tambuwal.
Recall that Governor Tambuwal’s last-minute withdrawal and endorsement of Atiku in the PDP primary race undermined Wike’s bid and contributed to his defeat. Since then, the PDP has been wracked with in-fighting as warring camps have formed around the different actors.
The choice of Tambuwal as the Campaign DG by Atiku is said to be a reward for his role in the latter’s emergence, although sources within the party note that it would escalate the crisis and completely alienate the southern bloc of the party who remain discontented with Atiku’s emergence after a call for power to return to the South.
The sources point out the party’s possible composition of a northern candidate, northern chairman, and northern campaign DG if Tambuwal’s appointment scales through, could increase sympathy for Governor Nyesom Wike and cause the southern extraction of the party to look elsewhere in 2023.
They blamed the apparent deterioration of things within the party on Atiku’s careless management of the crisis and refusal to yield ground on certain key issues to Wike who they claim has genuine reasons to express dissatisfaction.
Meanwhile, the war of words between the camps of Atiku and Wike has revved up, with the Rivers Governor seizing the media attention that has followed his commissioning of projects to mock Atiku’s flailing campaign and warn of an imminent defeat for the party in the General Elections.