Kogi Guber: Coalition warns PDP, Atiku against imposition of Dino as candidate

*Allegations far from the truth, Dino says

By Lateef Ibrahim, Abuja

A group, the Coalition of PDP Stakeholders in Kogi State has called on the national leadership of the party and its presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar to ensure that they do the right thing in the choice of who emerges as the party’s governorship candidate in the state.
The Kogi State governorship election has been scheduled to hold on November 11 this year by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
The spokesperson for the coalition, Hon. Farouk Adejoh-Audu, who addressed journalists along with other members of the group in Abuja on Wednesday, warned that the group will not accept any attempt to impose any candidate on the party.
The coalition insisted that the PDP members in the state should be given free hands to choose who want as their candidate for the election.
Already, nine aspirants have been cleared by the PDP for the party’s primary election slated for this month (April).
The coalition alleged that Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and the party’s leadership are working hard to impose one of the aspirants, Senator Dino Melaye as the party’s governorship candidate for the November election.
But Atiku had, in a statement on Tuesday, said that he had no preferred person among the governorship aspirants, cautioning that nobody should drop his name over the matter.
The Coalition, at its press conference in Abuja, said, “We are begging this national secretariat that pushed Peter Obi out of PDP that this time around, they should not push people out of PDP. We have stayed constant in PDP.
“The person they are trying to manipulate this ticket for has ran away from our party several times. He keeps going and coming. Some of us have been here and we don’t have any other party to go to.
“There is no possibility of us going to work with Yahaya Bello. There is no way we can function with him. That is why we have come to cry out that you should help us tell the world that even before the contest in Kogi is starts, the PDP is undermining its own fortune in our state.
“It is our party that is about to defeat our party in our state, not even the APC, by manipulating the delegates list.
“We now believe that even if we go for primaries, they will try to manipulate the process so that their preferred candidate will emerge. Everybody knows this candidate.
“It is very disheartening. The preferred candidate of the leadership of this party happens to be one man called Daniel Melaye alias Dino. That is the person they want to award the ticket.
“It shows a lot of contempt for the state we come from for anybody to sit down and think that Daniel Melaye is the right person, ignoring SANS, captains of industries, who are looking for this ticket.
“We are calling on Atiku, although we have heard his denial, but we don’t believe him. As a party leader, he has influence over this secretariat”, the group said.
Contacted on the matter, Senator Dino Melaye said that the allegations are imaginary and far from the truth.
According to Dino, “Accusations that Atiku wants to manipulate the list in my favour is also far from the truth.
“The real truth is that aspirants from Igala wanted the list manipulated but the party stood it’s ground.
“I have contested election inti House of Reps once, I won, Senate twice and won None of the aspirants, except Senator Attai Idoko, has ever won election
Please leave Atiku out of this.
“This is the time for PDP to come together as a united team to win”, he said.

END