Defections: Senator Abba Moro faults Atiku

The Senate Minority Leader, Senator Abba Moro, has faulted Atiku Abubakar for not playing a leading role in resolving the crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

The PDP has been enmeshed in a lingering crisis since the opposition party lost the 2023 presidential election.

The party’s crisis was recently compounded after key political stakeholders in Delta State, including the state governor, Sheriff Oborevwori and his predecessor, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, dumped the PDP and emptied the party’s structure into the ruling All Progressives Congress.

The wave of defections in Delta unsettled the PDP leadership, as the party lost the oil-rich state that has been one of its strongholds since 1999.

While the PDP crisis lingers with no resolution in sight, the party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, is also reportedly considering a move to another party ahead of the 2027 presidential election.

However, a member of the party and lawmaker representing Benue South has attributed the PDP crisis to Atiku’s failure to lead and unite the party after the 2023 election defeat.

Speaking during an interview with Channels Television on Tuesday, Moro said Atiku failed to galvanise the PDP after the 2023 election.

When asked whose responsibility it is to lead the party out of its lingering crisis, Moro said it is Atiku’s responsibility to resolve the party’s crisis since he has the ambition to become Nigeria’s President via the PDP platform.

He said, “Giving his ambition to contest one day and wishing to contest once more, I expected Alhaji Atiku Abubakar to have started from day one after the 2023 election to galvanise the PDP and hold some levels of cohesion within the party.

“So, quite frankly, I think that if there was any person at that point in time to bring the party together from the fallout and disastrous outing of the PDP in 2023, that person certainly was Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.”

Meanwhile, to address the PDP crisis, the party’s National Working Committee began an emergency meeting at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja on Tuesday.