House Of Reps Leadership: Why PDP Suspend Elumelu, Ikpeazu, Others

The Peoples Democratic Party has suspended seven of its members in the House of Representatives for one month.

The suspension notice was contained in a statement by the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Kola Ologbondiyan, who said the decision was reached after a meeting of the National Working Committee of the party.

Those suspended were Hon. Ndudi Elumelu, Hon. Wole Oke, Hon. Lynda Ikpeazu, Hon. Anayo Edwin, Hon. Gideon Gwadi, Hon. Toby Okechukwu and Hon. Adekoya Abdul-Majid.

They were suspended for their roles in the crisis rocking the House of representatives over the choice of Minority Leaders.

While the PDP sent the name of Kingsley Chinda from Rivers State as the Minority Leader, the Speaker of the House, Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, announced Elumelu for the position.

The PDP kicked against this, but the Chairman of the party’s Board of Trustees, Senator Walid Jibrin, backed Elumelu against the party.

The PDP then summoned Elumelu and the others for a meeting over the issue.

Ologbondiyan said in the statement on Friday: “The National Working Committee (NWC) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) met today, the 5th of July 2019 and reviewed issues surrounding the Minority Leadership of the House of Representatives.

“The Party noted the roles played by the under-listed members which resulted in the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, reading another list for Minority Leadership of the House other than the list submitted to him by our party, the PDP.”

Ologbondiyan who went ahead to list the names of the suspended members, added that after preliminary examination by the NWC, it was evident that the roles played by the affected Reps bordered on indiscipline, insubordination and disobedience of party directives contrary to Section 58 (1)(b)(c)(f)(h) of the PDP Constitution (as amended in 2017), which provides that: “Subject to the provision of this Constitution, the Party shall have power to discipline any member who says or does anything likely to bring the party into disrepute, hatred or contempt; disobeys or neglects to carry out lawful directives of the party or any organ or officer of the party; engages in anti-party activities; or engages in any conduct likely to cause disaffection among members of the party or is likely to disrupt the peaceful, lawful and efficient conduct of the business of the party.”

He said: “Consequent upon this, the above mentioned members of our party are hereby suspended for one month and this matter is hereby referred to the National Disciplinary Committee of our party, in keeping with Section 57(3) of the PDP Constitution.”