National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, has said the party is ready to call the bluff of its governors that are not ready to accept him.
He also said the party was not ready to collect money from the governors to fund the party, saying the PDP he now controls would not collect what he called “stolen money from the governors.”
He added that the party would not defend any of the governors when the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission came after them on how they spent state money while in office.
Sheriff, who spoke to Punch through his deputy, Dr. Cairo Ojougboh, in Abuja, said the party was ready to move on without the governors who refused to join hands in rebuilding the party.
Ojougboh, who said he was already in the South-East, where he said the party was going to commence its nationwide mobilisation, specifically said both the governors of Rivers and Ekiti states, Nyesom Wike and Ayodele Fayose, were free to leave the party if they so desired.
Sheriff and members of his team had, on Thursday in Abuja, walked out of a reconciliatory meeting called by former President Goodluck Jonathan over disagreements on how the meeting should be conducted.
Sheriff had insisted that he would preside over the meeting, but Wike and Fayose disagreed, saying Jonathan should preside since it was a reconciliatory and not a party meeting.
Ojougboh said, “We are moving on with the determination to reposition the party. We are not interested in the funding of the party from the governors. They are free to leave if they want to, especially Wike and Fayose.
“We are also not interested in their money. The party belongs to the people, they will finance it. So, if the governors want to withhold money from the party, they are free. We don’t receive stolen money. They have not been funding us and we are surviving.”
