My removal will make Jonathan vulnerable –Tukur

National Chairman, Peoples Democratic Party, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur

The National Chairman of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, has said that those calling for his removal are plotting to make President Goodluck Jonathan vulnerable.

He said this based on the increased clamour  by the PDP governors for his removal from office.

The party chairman wondered whether loyalty had become a crime in the nation’s polity.

Tukur, whose removal is considered one of the major conditions needed to restore peace to the troubled party, is also fighting to keep his job.

As part of their agitation for his removal, the governors met in Abuja, on Friday night, where they resolved that Tukur should resign in order to stem the tide of defections from the party.

The party has lost five of its governors to the major opposition party, the All Progressives Congress, a situation which is seen by many as a bad omen for the ruling party which is desirous of retaining power in 2015.

However, Tukur, who spoke with journalists through his Special Adviser on Political Affairs, Senator Umar Gada, in Abuja on Sunday, said some of the governors were not loyal to the President.

He said while he was aware that majority of them could be loyal to the President and the party, he, however, said there could be some whose loyalty were be in doubt.

Gada said, “As far as the national chairman, Tukur, is concerned, the PDP governors are loyal to the President and the national organ of the party, except for a few (of them) with hidden agenda who are hatching the plot to remove Tukur because of their personal presidential ambition.

“These few governors that are clamouring for the removal of Tukur are doing so with a hidden agenda to get back at President Jonathan.”