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Dr. Bukola Saraki |
This is not a decision that
I have made lightly. If anything at all, I have tarried for so long and did all
that was humanly possible, even in the face of great provocation, ridicule and
flagrant persecution, to give an opportunity for peace, reconciliation and
harmonious existence.
Perhaps, more significantly, I am mindful of the fact that I carry on my shoulder a great responsibility for thousands of my supporters, political associates and friends, who have trusted in my leadership and have attached their political fortunes to mine.
Perhaps, more significantly, I am mindful of the fact that I carry on my shoulder a great responsibility for thousands of my supporters, political associates and friends, who have trusted in my leadership and have attached their political fortunes to mine.
However, it is after an extensive consultation with all the important
stakeholders that we have come to this difficult but inevitable decision to
pitch our political tent elsewhere; where we could enjoy a greater sense of
belonging and where the interests of the greatest number of our Nigerians would
be best served.
While I take full
responsibility for this decision, I will like to emphasise that it is a
decision that has been inescapably imposed on me by certain elements and forces
within the APC who have ensured that the minimum conditions for peace,
cooperation, inclusion and a general sense of belonging did not exist.
They have done everything
to ensure that the basic rules of party administration, which should promote
harmonious relations among the various elements within the party were blatantly
disregarded. All governance principles which were required for a healthy
functioning of the party and the government were deliberately violated or
undermined. And all entreaties for justice, equity and fairness as basic
preconditions for peace and unity, not only within the party, but also the
country at large, were simply ignored, or employed as an additional pretext for
further exclusion.
The experience of my people
and associates in the past three years is that they have suffered alienation
and have been treated as outsiders in their own party. Thus, many have become
disaffected and disenchanted. At the same time, opportunities to seek redress
and correct these anomalies were deliberately blocked as a
government-within-a-government had formed an impregnable wall and left in the
cold, everyone else who was not recognized as “one of us”. This is why my
people, like all self-respecting people, would do, decided to seek
accommodation elsewhere.
I have had the privilege to
lead the Nigerian legislature in the past three years as the President of the
Senate and the Chairman of the National Assembly. The framers of our
constitution envisage a degree of benign tension among the three arms of
government if the principle of checks and balances must continue to serve as
the building block of our democracy. In my role as the head of the legislature,
and a leader of the party, I have ensured that this necessary tension did not
escalate at any time in such a way that it could encumber Executive function or
correspondingly, undermine the independence of the legislature. Over the years,
I have made great efforts in the overall interest of the country, and in spite
of my personal predicament, to manage situations that would otherwise have
resulted in unsavoury consequences for the government and the administration.
My colleagues in the Senate will bear testimony to this.
However, what we have seen
is a situation whereby every dissent from the legislature was framed as an
affront to the executive or as part of an agenda to undermine the government
itself. The populist notion of anti-corruption became a ready weapon for
silencing any form of dissent and for framing even principled objection as
“corruption fighting back”.
The persistent onslaught
against the legislature and open incitement of the people against their own
representatives became a default argument in defence of any short-coming of the
government in a manner that betrays all too easily, a certain contempt for the
Constitution itself or even the democracy that it is meant to serve.
Unfortunately, the
self-serving gulf that has been created between the leadership of the two
critical arms of government based on distrust and mutual suspicion has made any
form of constructive engagement impossible. Therefore, anything short of a
slavish surrender in a way that reduces the legislature to a mere rubber stamp
would not have been sufficient in procuring the kind of rapprochement that was
desired in the interest of all. But I have no doubt in my mind, that to
surrender this way is to be complicit in the subversion of the institution that
remains the very bastion of our democracy. I am a Democrat. And I believe that
anyone who lays even the most basic claim to being a Democrat will not accept
peace on those terms; which seeks to compromise the very basis of our existence
as the parliament of the people.
The recent weeks have
witnessed a rather unusual attempts to engage with some of these most critical
issues at stake. Unfortunately, the discord has been allowed to fester
unaddressed for too long, with dire consequences for the ultimate objective of
delivering the common good and achieving peace and unity in our country. Any
hope of reconciliation at this point was therefore very slim indeed. Most of
the horses had bolted from the stable.
The emergence of new
national party executives a few weeks ago held out some hopes, however slender.
The new party chairman has swung into action and did his best alongside some of
the Governors of APC and His Excellency, the Vice President.
I thank them for all their
great efforts to save the day and achieve reconciliation. Even though I thought
these efforts were coming late in the day but seeing the genuine commitment of
these gentlemen, I began to think that perhaps it was still possible to
reconsider the situation.
However, as I have realized
all along, there are some others in the party leadership hierarchy, who did not
think dialogue was the way forward and therefore chose to play the fifth
columnists. These individuals went to work and ensured that they scuttled the
great efforts and the good intentions of these aforementioned leaders of the
party. Perhaps, had these divisive forces not thrown the cogs in the wheel at
the last minutes, and in a manner that made it impossible to sustain any trust
in the process, the story today would have been different.
For me, I leave all that
behind me. Today, I start as I return to the party where I began my political
journey, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
When we left the PDP to
join the then-nascent coalition of All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2014, we
left in a quest for justice, equity and inclusion; the fundamental principles
on which the PDP was originally built but which it had deviated from. We were
attracted to the APC by its promise of change. We fought hard along with others
and defeated the PDP.
In retrospect, it is now
evident that the PDP has learnt more from its defeat than the APC has learnt
from its victory. The PDP that we return to is now a party that has learnt its
lessons the hard way and have realized that no member of the party should be
taken for granted; a party that has realized that inclusion, justice and equity
are basic preconditions for peace; a party that has realized that never again
can the people of Nigeria be taken for granted.
I am excited by the new
efforts, which seeks to build the reborn PDP on the core principles of
promoting democratic values; internal democracy; accountability; inclusion and
national competitiveness; genuine commitment to restructuring and devolution of
powers; and an abiding belief in zoning of political and elective offices as an
inevitable strategy for managing our rich diversity as a people of one great
indivisible nation called Nigeria.
What we have all agreed is
that a deep commitment to these ideals were not only a demonstration of our patriotism
but also a matter of enlightened self-interest, believing that our very
survival as political elites of this country will depend on our ability to earn
the trust of our people and in making them believe that, more than anything
else, we are committed to serving the people.
What the experience of the
last three years has taught us is that the most important task that we face as
a country is how to reunite our people. Never before had so many people in so
many parts of our country felt so alienated from their Nigerianness. Therefore,
we understand that the greatest task before us is to reunite the county and
give everyone a sense of belonging regardless of region or religion.
Every Nigerian must have an
instinctive confidence that he or she will be treated with justice and equity
in any part of the country regardless of the language they speak or how they
worship God. This is the great task that trumps all. Unless we are able to
achieve this, all other claims to progress, no matter how defined, would remain
unsustainable.
This is the task that I am
committing myself to and I believe that it is in this PDP, that I will have the
opportunity to play my part. It is my hope that the APC will respect the choice
that I have made as my democratic right, and understand that even though we
will now occupy a different political space, we do not necessarily become
enemies unto one another.
Thank you.
Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki,
CON
President of the Senate
President of the Senate
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