Ex-minister who caused stir during 2015 presidential election result announcements, Orubebe dumps PDP

A former Minister of Niger Delta in the Goodluck Jonathan administration, Godsday Orubebe, has resigned his membership of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

He announced his departure from the party in a letter dated June 20 and addressed to the PDP National Chairman, Senator lyorchia Ayu.

In the letter which was acknowledged by the office of the party’s chairman, Orubebe believes the PDP is not ready to reclaim power from the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 2023 general elections.

According to him, the party should have learned its lessons when it lost to the APC in 2015 and used the period of being an opposition to re-strategise how to return to power at the earliest opportunity.

The former minister faulted the emergence of a northerner as the presidential candidate of the party in the coming elections.

Stressing that it was against the PDP’s constitution to have its national chairman and presidential candidate come from the same region, he commended Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State for his courage at the primary.

Read the text of Orubebe’s letter below:

I write to formally inform you of my resignation from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). This I have communicated to the Chairman of Burutu Ward 3, Burutu Local Government Area, Delta State, effective 20th June 2022.

Consequently, I am by this letter intimating you of my total withdrawal from all activities at the Ward, Local, State, and National levels of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

I am highly honoured and privileged to have been part of a political party that successfully transformed a pariah nation into one that commanded respect in the comity of nations.

When we lost the presidential election in 2015 in bewildering circumstances, to say the least, it was my belief that the party would use the opposition period to re-strategise with the aim of taking back power at the earliest opportunity.

However, the present situation in the party does not inspire confidence that the party is ready to regain power in 2023.

Against the mood of the nation and in complete disregard for the provisions of the party’s constitution, the party, threw the zoning of the presidency open, which created a situation that led to the emergence of a Northerner as the party’s Presidential flagbearer, thus making the two topmost positions in the party, after your emergence as the National Chairman, to be occupied by northerners, contrary to section 7.3(c) of the party’s constitution.

I salute and commend the Governor of Rivers State, His Excellency, Nyesom Wike for his efforts and gallantry at the primaries. Posterity will be kind to him when the history of the party is written.

There are lots to be said, but out of respect for the party, I leave some stories untold at this time.

My belief in the sanctity of Nigeria is unshaken and I will continually work for her progress and development, even if it is through another route.

I thank you sir and I wish you all the best.

Yours sincerely,

Elder Godsday Peter Orubebe, CON