Nigeria Content Online

The Southwest
secretariat of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), on Monday,
reassured that President Goodluck Jonathan’s visit to Ibadan, the Oyo
State capital, to flag-off his presidential campaign in the zone will
hold as scheduled.

Tajudeen Oladipo,
the national vice chairman of the party for the zone, said this while
briefing the media on the activities lined up for the event at the
party office yesterday. Mr Oladipo called on the party members in the
zone to disregard news of a purported indefinite postponement of the
visit.

Text messages and
electronic media adverts yesterday claimed that the visit has been
postponed. The Ogun State television station, Gateway Television, also
aired announcements of the “postponement” repeatedly giving party
members reasons to worry as Governor Gbenga Daniel of Ogun State was
the zonal coordinator of the Jonathan/Sambo Campaign Organisation,
before it was dissolved last week.

Mr Oladipo added
that the President will lead other members of the party in the region
to flag-off the campaign at Mapo Hall at 10.00 am today. He said the
crisis in the Ogun State chapter of the party has gone beyond the
regional leaders and has been handed over to the national secretariat
of the party.

The two opposing
camps of Governor Daniel and that of former President Olusegun
Obasanjo, have been slugging it out on whose candidates will make the
final list of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for
the 2011 general elections in the state, having held different
primaries to produce two separate lists of candidates for the elections.

Though the INEC eventually accepted the list from Mr Obasanjo’s
camp, Mr Oladipo noted that the matter has become a subject of
litigation and the Commission will be guided by a court decision on
which list will finally feature at the elections. Mr Oladipo also
informed that the party will use a political solution to calm frayed
nerves in the crisis, arguing that the party could produce two lists
because it has many qualified people for the available elective posts.