The South West Elders’ Caucus of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), on Tuesday urged its national leadership to commence the process of rebuilding the party for progress.
The leaders gave the advice in a communiqué issued at the end of the caucus meeting in Lagos.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), reports that a Deputy National Chairman of the party and leader of the caucus, Chief Olabode George, presided over the meeting.
Shodipe-Dosunmu, who read the communiqué on behalf of the South West leaders of the party, said the PDP should “fix broken places, rectify the wrongs so as to heal the still festering sores”.
He also urged the national leadership of the party to return to the principle of fairness, equity, and justice.
Shodipe-Dosunmu urged the party to embrace selflessness men and women of integrity rather than those that would not work for the PDP.
He condemned the imposition of candidates to fly the party’s flag in the last elections, saying that the action might have affected the electoral fortunes of PDP in some states.
He said that all the elections were fraught with manipulations and distortions and that the PDP was mainly at the receiving end.
“We insist that the recent general elections were fraught with screaming flaws, deliberate sabotage, treachery and outright banditry.
“It is our resolve that the electoral process wherein results sheets were physically carried across the nation was absolutely primitive and apparently susceptible to all kinds of distortions.
“The apparent distortions in Yobe, Borno, Rivers, Lagos, Adamawa, Kano and several other places diminish the purity of a fledgling democracy,” he said.
He expressed the South West leaders’ and elders’ support for the party hierarchy to challenge the results of the presidential election at the tribunal.
He called for peace and unity in the country and appealed to Nigerians to protect the country’s democracy.
“We believe and trust in the indivisibility of the Nigerian union where merit prevails over mediocrity and where justice triumphs over inequality.
“We believe in a country where tribe and sectarian differences are promptly discarded for the greater good of the nation,” Shodipe-Dosunmu said.
Those present include a former Minister of Transportation, Chief Ebenezer Babatope, a former Lagos Chairman of the party, Capt. Tunji Shelle (Rtd), incumbent state Chairman, Dr Adegbola Dominic and Chief Joju Fadairo, a chieftain of the party in Ogun State.
A former Deputy-Governor of Lagos State, Mrs Kofoworola Bucknor, a former minister, Chief Wole Oyelese and a chieftain, Prince Uthman Shodipe-Dosunmu were also present.