Gemade Threatens To Leave PDP

The ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) may suffer another embarrassing loss if the threat by its former Chairman, Barnabas Gemade is anything to go by.
Gemade, who apparently has been at loggerheads with his governor, Mr. Gabriel Suswam of Benue State, has threatened to defect to the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) if the governor, who is eying a seat in the Senate when his tenure expires in 2015, carries out his threat to unseat him from the upper chamber of the National Assembly.

Gemade who currently represents Benue North-east in the Senate, hails from the same senatorial district as the governor who has already indicated interest in contesting for the same seat in May 2015.

THISDAY was reliably informed that the senator had asked the party to prevail on the governor to shelve his senatorial ambition and allow him to return to the Senate for another term next year, failing which he would be left with no option than to seek a return ticket on the platform of the APC.

A source in the party who is close to the senator, but did not want to be named, confirmed to THISDAY Monday that the former chairman indeed threatened to leave the PDP if he is upstaged by the governor.

He noted, however, that he might not carry out the threat, adding that securing a ticket on the platform of another party would not necessarily guarantee his victory at the general election.
According to him, if the governor deploys the machinery at his disposal as incumbent governor to seize the return ticket from the senator, he would also deploy the same machinery to win the election at all cost, the effect of which, he said, might not be palatable for the senator.

“It is true that he issued a threat to the party that he would be forced to leave if it fails to intervene in the matter and stop the governor from taking his ticket. But he’s not likely to carry out the threat because he has much at stake in the PDP.

“First, he is a former national chairman of the party. Second, he is a member of the National Executive Council (NEC). Third, he’s also a member of the Board of Trustees (BoT).
“If he leaves the party and loses, what becomes of him? APC is not a strong party in Benue State. And if the governor uses state power to seize the ticket from him, he will still use the same power to rig him out at the election and what will become of him when he loses?
“Don’t forget that if he leaves the party and comes back, it will take another five years for him to return as a member of NEC and BoT.

“But I don’t think he will carry out the threat because the senator is an establishment person and the party has been trying to prevail on the governor to drop his ambition because he’s still a young man and so age is still in his favour,” the source said.

This subtle threat issued by Gemade to his party in a way affirmed the comment by another senator who had told THISDAY last week that there were a number of senators, besides the initial 22 who are preparing to defect to APC, who want to leave the party but who have not been identified by both the PDP and the leadership of the Senate.

A senator had first informed THISDAY late last year that Gemade was eyeing APC as a result of the struggle for the senatorial ticket between him and Suswam.

Source: This Day