2023: PDP presents certificates of return to Bala, Fintiri, Adebutu, Makinde, Lamido, others

…Party ‘ll return to its winning ways, Ayu

By Folorunso Alagbede, Abuja

Governorship candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in twenty-six States were yesterday presented with certificates of return by the party’s national leadership ahead of next year’s general election.

Among the candidates were; Senator Bala Mohammed (Bauchi), Seyi Makinde (Oyo), Ahmadu Fintiri (Adamawa), Hon. Oladipupo Adubutu (Ogun), Mustapha Sule Lamido (Jigawa), Mohammed Ashiru (Kaduna), Peter Mbah (Enugu), David Hon. David Ombumgadu (Nasarawa) and Kefas Agbo (Taraba).

Certificates of return were however not presented to PDP candidates in Kano and Ebonyi States as a result of court cases.

Speaking at the colourful ceremony held at the party’s headquarters, Wadata, Abuja, the National Chairman of the PDP, Dr Iyorchia Ayu expressed the firm belief that the party will go back to its winning ways in the next year’s general elections.

Ayu said, “This exercise is partly a recognition of your hard work, Many of you have contributed enormously to the growth and development of this party and i want to thank you for your loyalty to the party. I want to congratulate you for this achievement.

“But remember, many are called but few are chosen. A few of you have been chosen to be our flag bearers in the forth coming elections.

“Everybody who contested with you is also chosen, you must carry every member of the aspirants community along because they contributed in mobilizing and growing our party.

“I want to sincerely thank you for the work you put in. And we hope you will continue to hard work because this is just the first step.

“We believe that the PDP will go back to his winning ways. When we started in 1999 We were able to produce 21 governors, we grew that number in 2003 to 28 are sustained it at 28 up to 2007.

“Unfortunately, we came through hard times and the number declined. Today we have only 13 governors, for a political party of this nature. That is not good enough.

“All of you must therefore work very hard to reconcile with whoever opposed you, work with everybody carry everybody along, So that at the end of the day by next year. We should be able to come back to at least 25 governors”, he said.

Speaking at the event, the PDP governorship candidate in Ogun State,

Hon. Oladipupo Adebutu described the certificate presentation as a challenge to work harder with a view to ensuring victory for the PDP next year

Adebutu, a former member of House of Representatives, said, “We know the journey is still far. We still have many odds to across and we’re not perturbed by the job ahead because we are driven by needs to set our people free from the shackles of mis governance.

“We take this as a challenge to work harder and we’re particularly grateful that our people and the party for the platform. PDP has given us this opportunity to go forward and rescue our state.

“We will continue to reach out to those that feel that they have a grouse. Am sure that with time, we shall have total reconciliation and we shall even extend hands of fellowship beyond the party and make it an inter party thing”, he said.

Also speaking, the Governor of Bauchi State and PDP candidate for next year’s election, Senator Bala Mohammed described yesterday’s event as “moment of happiness and a moment of accomplishment because we all toiled hard for this”.

He added, “We want to assure you that the party has gone through all the due diligence to make sure you emerge as candidates and we have seen the internal democracy that had been conducted to ensure peace in the party.

“We are going to work assiduously to make sure that our party emerged victorious at the various levels with the party having confidence in us”, he said.