REVEALED: How Jonathan Forced Tukur To Resign
More facts have emerged on the sudden exit of tough-talking Bamanga Tukur as the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Impeccable sources within the PDP and the presidency told a national daily that President Goodluck Jonathan forced Tukur to tender his resignation letter following Tukur’s assertion that the president could not force him to leave office.
Although Jonathan allegedly asked Tukur to make the sacrifice to protect the ruling PDP and the office of the president, it was learnt that Tukur’s statement angered the presidency.
President Jonathan had presented Tukur’s resignation letter to the 63rd meeting of the National Executive Committee of the party on Thursday, a few hours after Tukur had boasted that no one, including the president, could force him out of office.
The Presidency and PDP sources said that it was the statement that eventually consumed Tukur as he was
immediately invited to meet with the president and a few top political associates such as the chairman of PDP Board of Trustees Chief Tony Anenih, Vice President Namadi Sambo and a few aides where he was confronted with the statement. He answered in the affirmative and this led the president to ask him to resign in order to save the office of the president and the party.
Tukur had reportedly said: “I am an elected national chairman, I have my certificate of return, I cannot resign. The PDP convention brought me, so it has to take the convention that brought me for me to resign. Not even the president can ask me to resign. Remember, some members of the NWC were asked to go recently because the election that brought them was flawed; so Mr President cannot tread that route again.”
One of the presidency sources said: “In fairness to him, Tukur corroborated the media but claimed that he was quoted out of context, but President Jonathan advised him to save the party and the honour of the office of the president by doing the right thing (writing his letter of resignation). He apologised profusely to the president but it was too late for him.”
He further disclosed that the president reminded him that his NEC members had deserted him, and that 37 of the state chairmen had abandoned him including the governors and advised him to do the right thing that could save his integrity and that of the party.
The source explained that the failure of Tukur to reach out to the aggrieved governors on time was his undoing. And instead of reconciling with them, “he was boasting that even the president could not ask him to resign, using the INEC to blackmail. The PDP governors came to meet with the president and urged him to call Tukur to order in the interest of the party. And that was all,” the source said.
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