As the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, prepares for its National Convention in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, on May 21, it is being reported that the party has zoned the positions of President and Vice President in the 2019 election to the North and South East, respectively.
This was contained in a document obtained by Daily Sun on Thursday which indicates that the North will retain the seat of the Senate President while the South-South would be allowed to produce the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the national chairman of the party.
For the South West, the party afforded them the positions of deputy Senate President, deputy National Secretary and National Organising Secretary.
Aside producing the Vice Presidential candidate of the party, the South East will also have the positions of national legal adviser, national treasurer and national youth Leader.
The report added that apart from the North producing the President and Senate President, the region will also produce the deputy Speaker, deputy National Chairman and the party’s national secretary.
Other offices zoned to the region include the national financial secretary, national publicity secretary, national auditor and national women leader.
The document proposed that further zoning to the South for the May 21 PDP convention will be guided by so many factors, one of which is that South-West and South-South had produced the country’s presidents and that the South-East has not and should be given the opportunity for the highest office in the new dispensation.
Another factor is that the South-West and South-East had produced Speaker and President of the Senate, respectively, while the South-South has not tasted any of those.
The South-West had also produced the national treasurer, national youth leader, national financial secretary as well as the national legal adviser, while the South East has produced national women leader.
Records also show that the South South has also produced national secretary and national organising secretary while the South South and North Central traditionally swap positions in the party’s zoning arrangement.
The newspaper further reports that in the proposed 2016 zoning arrangement, the party stated that in order to give PDP a new lease of life, it was imperative that a clause in the guidelines for the 2016 National Convention be included, barring all those who had served the party, especially during the immediate past tenure of the outgoing National Working Committee, NWC, from contesting for any office in the incoming dispensation.
